1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:04,720 Mr. Bernhard works here at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. 2 00:00:04,720 --> 00:00:07,880 I asked him if he could tell me more about oil and especially where to find it. 3 00:00:07,880 --> 00:00:10,240 Welcome to the Houston Museum of Natural Science. 4 00:00:10,240 --> 00:00:12,520 You've come to the right place if you want to learn about oil. 5 00:00:12,520 --> 00:00:15,880 I learned in school that oil, gas, and coal are called fossil fuels because they're made 6 00:00:15,880 --> 00:00:18,320 from plants and animals that lived millions of years ago. 7 00:00:18,320 --> 00:00:21,200 That's correct, but we actually have to start further back than that when the Earth was 8 00:00:21,200 --> 00:00:22,200 first formed. 9 00:00:22,200 --> 00:00:23,200 Really? 10 00:00:23,200 --> 00:00:26,920 Billions of years ago, the Earth's crust began to move around on top of the Earth's hot liquid 11 00:00:26,920 --> 00:00:27,920 center. 12 00:00:27,920 --> 00:00:31,080 This movement created spaces between the land known as sedimentary basins. 13 00:00:31,080 --> 00:00:33,080 Let me show you. 14 00:00:33,080 --> 00:00:34,560 That's what I call research. 15 00:00:34,560 --> 00:00:38,880 Just imagine that the chocolate is the land and the chewy caramel is the Earth's liquid 16 00:00:38,880 --> 00:00:39,880 center. 17 00:00:39,880 --> 00:00:41,840 You see the sunken spaces opening? 18 00:00:41,840 --> 00:00:45,440 These basins made the perfect places for oil and gas to form. 19 00:00:45,440 --> 00:00:46,440 Cool. 20 00:00:46,440 --> 00:00:48,280 So what happened after the basins formed? 21 00:00:48,280 --> 00:00:52,840 These basins filled with water, forming oceans, seas, and large lakes. 22 00:00:52,840 --> 00:00:56,000 Billions of microscopic plants and animals thrived in these basins. 23 00:00:56,080 --> 00:00:58,160 How did the plants and animals become oil? 24 00:00:58,160 --> 00:01:02,320 The plants and animals died and their remains piled up on the basin floor. 25 00:01:02,320 --> 00:01:05,640 This organic matter eventually transformed into oil and gas. 26 00:01:05,640 --> 00:01:08,720 Wouldn't the dead plants and animals just decay and decompose? 27 00:01:08,720 --> 00:01:13,080 Under normal conditions, yes, but for oil and gas to form, anaerobic conditions must 28 00:01:13,080 --> 00:01:14,080 exist. 29 00:01:14,080 --> 00:01:15,960 What are anaerobic conditions? 30 00:01:15,960 --> 00:01:18,720 Those are just places where there's no oxygen present. 31 00:01:18,720 --> 00:01:23,600 The organic material was then covered by sediment, forming distinct layers of sedimentary rock. 32 00:01:23,600 --> 00:01:24,600 Have a look at this. 33 00:01:26,000 --> 00:01:31,160 That's cool. 34 00:01:31,160 --> 00:01:35,200 So once the organic matter is covered with sediment, how does it become oil? 35 00:01:35,200 --> 00:01:40,080 The weight of the layers of mud and sand combined with heat from inside the Earth turn the mud 36 00:01:40,080 --> 00:01:41,760 and sand into layers of rock. 37 00:01:41,760 --> 00:01:44,560 We learned that the deeper you go into the Earth, the hotter it gets. 38 00:01:44,560 --> 00:01:48,780 That's right, and as the organic source rock was buried deeper and deeper, temperatures 39 00:01:48,780 --> 00:01:54,440 reached 100 to 150 degrees Celsius, cooking the organic matter into a gooey black soup 40 00:01:54,440 --> 00:01:57,440 that became black gold, or Texas tea. 41 00:01:57,440 --> 00:01:59,520 Tony would like to hear about black gold. 42 00:01:59,520 --> 00:02:04,360 The rock above the oil may look solid, but it actually is very porous and contains millions 43 00:02:04,360 --> 00:02:05,360 of tiny holes. 44 00:02:05,360 --> 00:02:07,440 You see this flask of oil and water? 45 00:02:07,440 --> 00:02:09,680 Can you tell which layer is on top? 46 00:02:09,680 --> 00:02:11,320 It's definitely the oil. 47 00:02:11,320 --> 00:02:12,320 You're correct. 48 00:02:12,320 --> 00:02:16,040 Oil is lighter than water, so it keeps floating up through the spaces in the rock above it. 49 00:02:16,040 --> 00:02:20,880 It will eventually either reach the surface or be trapped by an impermeable layer of rock. 50 00:02:20,880 --> 00:02:22,320 You mean rock without holes. 51 00:02:22,320 --> 00:02:23,320 Yes. 52 00:02:23,320 --> 00:02:26,400 This layer traps the oil and it begins to build a reservoir. 53 00:02:26,400 --> 00:02:28,040 This information is really helpful. 54 00:02:28,040 --> 00:02:30,440 Now I just need to find out how you get the oil out of the ground. 55 00:02:30,440 --> 00:02:33,280 We've got some great exhibits here to help you learn how oil is extracted. 56 00:02:33,280 --> 00:02:34,280 Feel free to look around. 57 00:02:34,280 --> 00:02:35,280 Thanks, Mr. Bernhard. 58 00:02:35,280 --> 00:02:37,320 You might also want to talk to Mr. Wells. 59 00:02:37,320 --> 00:02:41,160 He's at the Ocean Star Museum in Galveston and used to be a working oil rig. 60 00:02:41,160 --> 00:02:41,800 That would be great.