Fossil Fuels

Fossil Fuels — page 3 — FOSSIL FUELS in jet aircraft the heat yielded by burning a fossil fuel serves to increase both the pressure and the temperature of the combustion products to furnish motive power Fossil fuels are not distributed evenly across the Earth The United States Russia and China have the largest coal deposits in the world Sizable deposits also are located in Australia India and South Africa More than half of the world’s known oil and natural gas reserves are located in the Middle East This means that the Middle East contains more oil than the rest of the world combined Major reserves are also found in Canada and the United States Latin America Africa and parts of Russia Transcaucasia and Central Asia Each of these regions contains less than 15 percent of the world’s proven reserves Fossil fuel usage has steadily increased since the Industrial Revolution At the start of the twenty-first century fossil fuels comprised nearly 90 percent of the world’s energy supplies However fossil fuels are nonrenewable resources Because it takes millions of years for fossil fuels to form they cannot be replaced when they are used Burning petroleum and coal releases harmful gases such as carbon monoxide nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide These gases pollute the air and react 6

Fossil Fuels — page 4 — INTRODUCTION Before they can be used fossil fuels must be extracted from the ground This beam-pumping unit on top of an oil well is used to lift oil up to the surface with moisture in the atmosphere to create acid rain Scientific evidence shows that burning fossil fuels increases atmospheric temperatures This warming of Earth’s atmosphere called the greenhouse effect contributes to climate change a serious environmental environmental concern 7

Fossil Fuels — page 5 — Chapter One COAL One of the most important natural fuels coal was formed from plant life buried in the Earth millions of years ago A hydrocarbon coal is classified in ranks or types according to the amount of heat it produces This depends upon the amount of fixed carbon it contains The ranks in increasing order are lignite or brown coal subbituminous coal or very soft coal bituminous coal or soft coal and anthracite or hard coal Bituminous coal is the most abundant type Coal is most commonly used to produce electricity in power plants It also is an important fuel for heating and powering industrial and manufacturing facilities and for making steel The many chemicals derived from coal are used in industrial processes and in the 8

Fossil Fuels — page 6 — COAL manufacture of nylon paints plastics synthetic rubber rubber aspirin and thousands of other useful products WHERE COAL IS FOUND China is estimated to have the largest recoverable coal reserves in the world about 45 percent of the world’s total The United States has about 23 percent of the total The United States recoverable reserves are estimated at 265 billion tons 240 billion metric tons enough to last about 250 years at present consumption consumption rates This map shows where deposits of various types of coal can be found around the world 9

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