ESL Lesson 1
Oil in Our Every Day Life
ESL Lesson 2
The History of Mining
ESL Lesson 3
Economic growth
ESL Lesson 4
Delivery Systems
ESL Lesson 5
Cities and Population Movement
ESL Lesson 6
Recycling
ESL Lesson 7
Rubber
ESL Lesson 8
Farming
Environmental Considerations
Surface-mining of oil shale deposits (an area of oil shale) has all the normal environmental effects from open-pit mining. In addition (also), the pre-refining process to obtain crude oil generates (makes) ash, and the waste rock [a known carcinogen] (cancer causing substance) must be disposed of. Oil shale rock expands by around 30% after processing due to a popcorn effect from the heating; this waste then needs disposal ( to take away and get rid of). Oil shale processing also requires large amounts of water, which may be in short supply.
The energy demands of blasting, transporting, crushing, heating the material, and then adding hydrogen, together with the safe disposal of huge quantities of cancer causing waste material, are large. These inefficiencies (wasteful ways to do something), plus the cost of environmental restoration (repair), mean that oil shale exploitation (usage) will only be economical when oil prices are high and projected to remain so. Currently, the in-situ process is the most attractive due to the reduction (less of) in normal surface/strip-mining environmental problems. However, in-situ processes do involve possible significant (large) environmental costs to aquifers (area of drinking water underground), especially since current in-situ methods may require some other form of barrier (wall) to restrict (stop) the flow of the oil into these groundwater aquifers.
References- Energy Information Administration, Annual Energy Outlook 2006
- Shell's Ingenious Approach to Oil Shale is Pretty Slick, Rocky Mountain News, 09/03, 2005
- World Energy Council - Oil shale
- WorldOil.com - Oil shale back in the picture
- Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Department of the Interior before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Oversight Hearing on Oil Shale Development Efforts, Bureau of Land Management. April 12, 2005
- Production Optimization: They're playing the shale card again. Hart's E&P Net, June 2002
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_shale
Continue to: Shale Oil Extraction Imminent
............................................................
Recycling
............................................................
Oil shale
............................................................
Economics
............................................................
Environmental Considerations
............................................................
Shale Oil Extraction Imminent
............................................................