Ask A Scientist© General Science Archive

 > >  name       MICHAEL
 > >  status     other
 > >  age        30s
 >
 > >  Question - hOW MANY GALLONS OF OIL DOES IT TAKE TO PRODUCE ONE
GALLON OF GASOLINE?
 >
 >
 >Depending on the crude oil quality, the refining process, etc...about a
ten percent yeild in gas from crude oil is reasonable.
 >
 >peter f.

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 >--in response to this question about the conversion of crude oil to
 >gasoline, I did some checking. Following a lead from a friend (who is
being "cc'ed" on this message) I contacted the Energy Information
Administration of the DOE using their website (www.eia.doe.gov).
 >
 >I called a person at EIA in Washington who referred me to Table 31 of
the EIA's Petroleum Supply Monthly, which you can get by doing a search for
the document off the main EIA webpage. It turns out that production runs at
 >typical U.S. refineries vary monthly and this gentleman said for March
2000, the typical US refinery was putting out 47% of its crude oil input as
 >finished gasoline. In other words, 1 gallon of U.S.crude was resulting
in 0.47 gallons of gasoline. This is a rough conversion and it varies
depending on production rates, so it is not precise.
 >
 >I also contacted the people at OPIS magazine, based on another website
my friend referred me to, and the editor replied to me. He confirmed that
 >production runs at refineries vary from time to time but offered the opinion
 >that roughly 67% of a yield of a barrel (42 gal.) of crude oil is gasoline.
 >He estimated that it takes about 1.5 gallons of crude to make 1 gallon
of gasoline.
 >
 >You can, therefore, see that there is not an exact conversion of crude
oil to gasoline in terms of production (which depends on a lot of factors).
For the purpose of a response to your Newton inquirer, you may want to
advise the person that the conversion from crude to gasoline does vary from
 >refinery to refinery (it appears to also vary from country to country
based on some data I saw), but that a range is FROM 1 gallon of crude = 0.47
gal of gasoline TO 1.5 gallons of crude = 1 gal of gasoline.
 >
 >You may want to refer the inquirer to the EIA website, in particular
the Petroleum Supply Monthly, because it has tons of information in it. If
the person was able to reach Newton via the NET, he can reach the EIA
website and dabble until he drops!
 >
 >Regards,
 >John Suermann 
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