Palm | Kelapa Sawit

Formation of Fossil Fuels (Coal, Petroleum):

Energy and minerals are the life-blood of modern day world. Rapid industrial growth and growth in human population has brought the consumption of energy and mineral to a very high level. Ironically, resources are not unlimited. We know, the fossil fuels – coal, petroleum and natural gas – provide most of our needs of energy; till recently, coal used to be major source of energy. Due to recent hike in price of petroleum products, coal again is getting importance as major source of energy.

Geologically fossil fuels (coal and petroleum) have been originated from very old-buried (more than hundreds of million years old) of plants, animals and microorganisms and overlaid with sediments. This burial protected these vegetation and microorganism from oxygen, which would have completed its breakdown, and preserved it instead it into partially decayed form as coal and petroleum. Coal originated from plants & trees, whereas petroleum & natural gas originated from marine organism. Chemically, all fossil fuels consist largely of hydrocarbons, which are compounds composed of hydrogen and carbon.

The various stages of coal formation are:

(a) Peat - partially carbonized plant matter,

(b) Lignite - soft brownish-black coal with low carbon content,

(c) Sub-bituminous coal - soft coal with intermediate carbon content,

(d) Bituminous coal - soft coal with higher carbon and lower moisture content than sub-bituminous coal,

(e) Anthracite coal - hard coal with highest carbon content and lowest moisture content.

Methane (CH4) gas, which is a hydrocarbon compound, is also entrapped in most of the coal seams; is now finding importance in recovery from coal seam due to recent energy crisis.

The petroleum and gas deposits are particularly prevalent in coastal zones. Largely, our cars and vehicles are powered by diesel, gasoline and natural gas.

Vast quantity of oil is locked-up in a fine grained sedimentary rock called oil shale. This contains high proportion of ‘kerogen’, a solid organic material, when heated produces oil vapour from which oil can be recovered.