Visit a natural history museum, and there's nine-to-one chance that you will find fossils – remains of animals and plants that died millions (or even billions) of years ago. By analyzing these fossils, paleontologists can figure out how these animals actually looked like, and how different species have evolved over time. However, these fossils are not only used in labs, but also in our everyday lives – as a form of energy! And, as if emphasizing that fact, they are literally called 'fossil fuels.'

Nowadays, fossil fuels are what literally 'power the world'– indeed, energy from these fossils are used widely in our lives as a very versatile and useful form of energy – from cars and factories to lighting and central heating. Considered now as invaluable to our daily lives, fossil fuels are truly amazing in their way. Today we will look at how they're amazing – and how they aren't.

How were Fossil Fuels Made?

Of course, we don't literally throw dinosaur bones and old shells into our cars' fuel tanks. What we are really using as fossil fuels are results of fossils having changed from receiving (generally) heat and pressure over time.
There are largely three forms of fossil fuels that we commonly use: oil (petroleum), coal, and natural gas.

1. Coal

Coal is a greyish-black, brittle solid. Coal was formed from the vast forests that covered the Earth during the Carboniferous Era (in fact, that's why it is called 'Carboniferous,' adhering to the carbon contents in coal). As these trees died and collapsed, they formed a layer of dead plant matter. Over time, rock and soil piled above, exerting pressure and heat on the dead plant layer. This gradually compressed the organic matter into the brittle substance we know as coal.

Depending on the percentage of carbon, coal is divided into three types – anthracite, bituminous and lignite. Anthracite coal has the most amount of carbon, and is the hardest and darkest, as well as containing more energy. Lignite coal contains the least amount of carbon it is therefore soft and light coloured, and the lowest in terms of energy release. Bituminous coal is in between. Consequentially, anthracite coal is the most expensive, and used most widely.

2. Oil (petroleum)

Oil (petroleum) is a pitch-black, sticky liquid, made up of mostly carbon and hydrogen but including other elements as well, such as sulfur. Also known as petroleum, it was made from the remains of dead sea animals that deposited and piled on the sea floor. As time passed, sediments of rock and sand piled up above the remains the immense pressure and heat turned them into oil and gas. As the continental shift and tectonic movement gradually changed the Earth's land mass, the 'pockets' of oil moved up to the surface.

3. Natural Gas

Natural gas is usually a derivative of petroleum. During the process of the formation of petroleum, lighter methane molecules of the petroleum evaporated and turned into flammable gas. Natural gas can also be acquired by gently heating petroleum from the ground.

Extracting and Refining the Fossil Fuels

Because of their process of formation, fossil fuels tend to be buried deep underground, and often mixed with unwanted impurities – it falls to us naturally to extract them out of the ground, and refine them into a purer form.

Coal is a solid, and therefore needs to be mined like mineral ores. Long tunnels are dug through coal layers in the Earth, and the coal ore is mined out. The ore is then smashed and pounded, and impurities (bits of rocks and stones) are drained out. The purified coal is then packed cylindrical shapes, and sold.

Petroleum is a liquid, and must be pumped up to the surface from deep underground. This requires the construction of oil-extracting facilities above the source of oil, such as a pump mechanism (if the source of oil is under the sea, an offshore oil platform is preferable). Once pumped out, the oil is sent to the refinery, where it is heated at varying temperatures and split into many different chemicals. The majority of this gasoline and distillate fuel these are used for small automobiles and buses respectively.

How do Fossil Fuels Produce Energy?

Fossil Fuels are 'fuels –' they are combusted to produce energy in form of heat and light. It's this heat energy that can be converted into other forms of energy so that we can use it in our lives.

In Fossil Fuel power plants, the fossil fuel is burned to release heat and turn water into steam, consequentially generating electricity. In central heating systems, they are burned to create hot air, which circulates around the pipes to warm the house. In factories, they are used to heat furnaces and chemical tanks. In cars, fossil fuels (predominantly gasoline) are burned to create a sudden expansion of gas, which pushes a piston and rotates the axle, which keeps the car going.

Because heat energy is relatively a 'low-state' form of energy, it is not easily converted into other forms of energy. Converting heat energy to electrical energy is much harder (and less efficient) than converting electrical energy to heat energy. This means that whenever using fossil fuels to produce energy that is not in form of heat, we are always wasting a good portion of the energy that was originally in the fossil fuels (more to be talked about in the Advantages & Disadvantages Section).

Advantages & Disadvantages

While we tend to think fossil fuels are 'bad stuff,' they do have some important advantages, which make them so attractive energy resources. Let's see how.

First of all, fossil fuels are easily stored, transported and processed. They are practically the only form of energy that is actually 'an object. It's impossible to transport 'hydroelectricity' or 'solar energy' in itself (you're not seriously thinking of carrying water and sunlight from one place to another, are you?) it's necessary to first convert them into forms transportable (e.g. electricity), which can be costly and inefficient, and often is impossible for large amounts.. For fossil fuels, they can just be carried around in trucks and tankers to anywhere, and in large amounts. Same goes for Uranium, but it is radioactive and must be sealed in heavy lead cylinders besides, it's never really necessary to transport hundreds of thousands of tons of Uranium, since it's so expensive, and a small amount produces so much energy.

Secondly, the extraction of fossil fuels – and consequentially energy production from fossil fuels – are not affected by season, time, or location. There are sources of coal, petroleum and natural gases all over the world, and hence are generally readily available. Same goes for the power plants - while hydroelectric power stations must be built near waterfalls and solar farms in sunny areas (and they can only work during day, too), fossil fuel power stations can be built anywhere, and generate electricity 24/7.

Finally, they simply have enormous outputs of energy compared to other sources, by calorific value. This also makes it easy to acquire energy from them while wind power, wave power, solar power and geothermal power all require complex systems of mechanism to generate electricity, fossil fuels power plants just need a furnace, some water pipes, a turbine and a generator (how simple!). This also makes building fossil fuel power stations much easier and cheaper to build and maintain, which is a huge advantage over other types of power plants that require a huge initial capital invested.

Think that's a lot? There are just as many disadvantages. Fossil fuels generally must be combusted to extract energy this combustion emits carbon dioxide and heavy metals, as well as toxic chemicals such as carbon monoxide and sulfur dioxide – all of which have negative effects on the environment. The latter two cause respiratory and ocular diseases in people, as well as turning rain acidic and harming plants and animals. Heavy metals deposit inside our body and cause critical disorders carbon dioxide contributes towards global warming.

Another important thing to look at is that fossil fuels are nonrenewable. Their formation was mostly during the Carboniferous Era and Permian Era (basically a long, long time ago on the Earth), and there is a limited supply of them obviously if we keep using them, they will run out someday. It is speculated that the supply of coal, petroleum and natural gas will run out by the end of next century, and when they're gone, they're gone – they irreplaceable. However, us humans are so dependent on it (At least 40 % of USA's energy use comes from fossil fuels) that when they are gone, we will be desperately in demand for alternatives. Hence, it is important that we do not become too dependent on it, and make sure we have alternative energy resources in case fossil fuels are depleted in the future.

Furthermore, fossil fuels are highly flammable, which make them very vulnerable to accidental explosions. These accidents often happen during transportation a single mistake of the pilot can send the oil tanker crashing into protruding seashore rocks that are very difficult to detect – such accidents often end up with the oil spilling out and clogging up the surrounding environment with its black stickiness, if not simply catching fire and destroying everything around (not to mention carbon dioxide emission). In either case, there is harm done to the environment hence, handling fossil fuels always means a high risk.

Lastly, coal and petroleum are not only energy sources, but also trade merchandises. Crude oil is currently more or less 3-4 US dollars, and coal 60-70 US dollars per ton, which is rather cheap for the high energy output acquired upon burning them. This price, of course, is largely subject to market fluctuations petroleum economy is so very delicate that a price increase of 10 cents per gallon of petroleum is enough to bring in enormous sales profits for selling companies (and enormous deficit for the buyers). When the price of gasoline skyrocketed during the Gulf War, the entire world was devastated by the 'Oil Shock –' gas stations limited gasoline sold to customers and the bicycle outlets were fluxed with sudden profits. Such energy sources with continuously changing prices cannot be counted upon as being very reliable.

Case Study

Although fossil fuels can be found all around the world, coal is produced particularly predominantly in USA, Russia, China, India, Australia, and South Africa petroleum in Saudi Arabia, USA, Iraq, Iran, UAE, Russia, Canada, China and Mexico. Fossil fuels are consumed predominantly by USA, China, Russia, France, UK, and other EU countries (USA alone consumes almost 25 % of the world?s total fossil fuel production). The general trend is that the major economic powers of the world consume large amounts of fossil fuel (which is naturally necessary for their industries) that does not mean that all rich countries follow that trend, such as Netherlands and Sweden, which are both MEDCs but consume very little fossil fuels. The greater part of their energy supplies come from other forms of energy resources, such as hydroelectric power. These countries, however, never play leading roles in global politics, security and trade countries like USA and Russia, which have large armies and industries, boast political predominance worldwide, but also need large amounts of fossil fuels to sustain that status.

LEDCs generally depend on relatively cheap fossil fuels, since they do not have technology nor capita to make use of renewable energy resources hence the reason their atmosphere is often heavily polluted (of course metropolitan cities in USA and China are no better, such as New York City or Shanghai). Some LEDCs or semi-MEDCs rely on exportation of fossil fuels for money (such as Iraq or Indonesia) these nations do consume these fossil fuels for themselves as well, and generally never invest in alternative energy resources (with the exception of UAE, which recently has begun researching advanced technologies for solar farms). Lastly, there are those MEDCs that profit from exporting fossil fuels, but rarely use them themselves, relying instead on alternative energy resources Norway and Canada are such examples.

Area of Research in the Future

The big problem we have with fossil fuels is the emission of toxic gases and heavy metals. The more fossil fuels we burn, the more of these chemicals we are producing. Because of this, nearly all cars and factories have filters and precipitators fit into their emission pipes light air molecules can pass through, while sulfur dioxide and heavy metals, which are heavier, cannot. Filters have proved extremely effective in minimizing toxic chemicals emission, greatly enhancing the air qualities of the major cities around the world. However, these filters are often expensive, and are not enforced properly in LEDCs – it is necessary that cheaper filtering technologies are devised, and that MEDCs give economic aid to these countries for that purpose.

Another problem is conversion efficiency. The current fossil fuel engines we have are extremely inefficient more than half of the energy potential to fossil fuels are literally wasted, in the process of converting the other half into whatever form we need. If we are going to keep using fossil fuels, we will probably need to research means of using them more efficiently, so that we do not need as much, and gradually become less dependent on them.

However, our ultimate goal is to gradually phase out of fossil fuels, and switch to alternative energy resources. Obviously this will be difficult (judging from how much fossil fuels the modern world consumes), but we all know that it must be done someday. In order to fill up the gap made by the depletion of fossil fuels, we need to not only find newer forms of renewable energy resources, but work to increase the efficiency of already existing energy resources. Although our daily lives consist of cars running on oil and factory items made by burning coal, someday must all learn to live without fossil fuels - for we all know that the world will be a very different place from the day we burn up the last drop of oil, the last piece of coal, and the last puff of natural gas.

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