PETROLEUM
WHAT IS PETROLEUM AND HOW IS IT FORMED?
Petroleum is a dark, oily fluid that is irregularly distributed in sedimentary rocks throughout the world. There are several ideas about the origin of petroleum. The most widely accepted of these is that billions of plants and animals lived and died in widespread seas and their remains decomposed and released fluid, fatty particles. These were distilled into “hydrocarbons” (a mixture of the elements hydrogen and carbon, such as gas and oil).
HOW AND WHERE DID OIL COLLECT IN ROCKS?
The hydrocarbons, or oil and gas droplets, were buried by countless tons of sediments that accumulated on ancient sea bottoms. As these sediments hardened into sedimentary rocks, the hydrocarbons were squeezed into whatever empty spaces were available in the rocks. As the layers of sedimentary rocks later became folded and broken, oil and gas droplets and salt water moved upward through any interconnecting open spaces. Some droplets escaped to the surface as “seeps,” but many were trapped when they came up against a nonporous barrier. Gas, being lighter than either oil or water, was trapped at the top, and oil was stopped in the middle, above the salt water. An accumulation of this kind is termed a “pool” or a “field.”
WHERE DID OIL ACCUMULATE IN ILLINOIS?
Conditions under which oil is found in Illinois ([fig. 7]) are as follows: (a) coral reefs, (b) anticlines (upfolds or arches of rock layers), (c) “pinching” or “lensing” out of dipping, overlapping porous rock layers, and (d) buried sandstone-filled ancient stream channels.
ARE THERE LAKES OR RIVERS OF OIL UNDERGROUND?
No. Oil and gas accumulate in the pores (openings) between silt and sand grains and in small openings in limestone and dolomite.
