My first encounter with the importance of oil was in 1962. I had just watched an episode of the witty sitcom The Beverly Hillbillies that began with a catchy theme song: “Come and listen to my story about a man named Jed, a poor mountaineer, barely kept his family fed. And then one day he was shootin’ at some food, and up through the ground came a-bubblin’ crude. Oil that is, black gold, Texas tea. Well, the first thing you know, ol’ Jed’s a millionaire.”

Why would someone become a millionaire just because a thick black fluid bubbled out of the ground on his property? That really didn’t come clear to me until I was studying organic chemistry. And then it did not take long to realize that the world runs on oil.

Besides being critical for transportation, oil is the source of the chemicals that can be converted into pharmaceuticals, synthetic fibres, plastics, detergents, cosmetics, adhesives, lubricants, paints, roofing materials and asphalt. Without oil, modern civilization grinds to a halt. That makes for a fascinating story.

First, some terms need clarification. Although “petroleum” and “oil” are often used interchangeably, they are not the same.

Millions of years ago, tiny algae, zooplankton and bacteria (not dinosaurs) died and settled on the sea floor where they eventually became buried in sand and mud. In this anaerobic environment, under pressure and heat, they were converted into a mixture of hydrocarbons, molecules that contain only carbon and hydrogen. This mixture, being lighter than water, travelled up and leached into porous sedimentary rock and was then trapped by a layer of impermeable rock forming a reservoir of petroleum.........

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