the.com/oil
the planet's bottled sunlight, fueling civilization and fistfights in roughly equal measure
means A slippery, water-resistant liquid—whether pressed from plants, rendered from animals, or pumped from underground—used for fuel, lubrication, cooking, or painting.
from English borrowed it through Old French 'oile' from Latin 'oleum,' meaning olive oil specifically—itself a cousin of the Greek 'elaion,' from 'elaia,' the olive. For the ancient Mediterranean world, oil simply meant the pressed juice of the olive; only later did the word stretch to cover every greasy liquid we squeeze, render, or drill from the earth. The 'oil' and the 'olive' are, etymologically, the same word wearing different clothes.
- ancient sun
- Made from algae cooked for millions of years
- first well
- Drilled in Pennsylvania, 1859, by Edwin Drake
- price war
- In 2020 oil futures went negative below zero
- daily thirst
- World burns roughly 100 million barrels every day
- hidden in everything
- Plastics, aspirin, lipstick all start as crude
saudi aramco — world's largest oil company by market cap, produces ~13 million barrels daily
deepwater horizon spill — 2010 gulf of mexico disaster, 4.9 million barrels leaked over 87 days
alaska pipeline — 800-mile infrastructure completed 1977, transports 500,000 barrels per day from prudhoe bay
brent crude — north sea oil benchmark used to price global crude since 1987