Crude oil is a mixture of hydrocarbons that formed from plants and animals that lived millions of years ago. Crude oil is a fossil fuel, and it exists in liquid form in underground reservoirs, in tiny spaces within sedimentary rocks, and near the surface in tar (or oil) sands. Petroleum products are fuels made from crude oil and other hydrocarbons contained in natural gas. Petroleum products can also be made from coal, natural gas, and biomass.

Products made from crude oil

After crude oil is removed from the ground, it is sent to a refinery where different parts of the crude oil are separated into useable petroleum products. These petroleum products include gasoline, distillates such as diesel fuel and heating oil, jet fuel, petrochemical feedstocks, waxes, lubricating oils, and asphalt.

A U.S 42-gallon barrel of crude oil yields about 45 gallons of petroleum products in U.S. refineries because of refinery processing gain. This increase in volume is similar to what happens to popcorn when it is popped.

Source EIA – https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/index.cfm?page=oil_home#tab1

What are petroleum products, and what is petroleum used for?

Petroleum products include transportation fuels, fuel oils for heating and electricity generation, asphalt and road oil, and feedstocks for making the chemicals, plastics, and synthetic materials that are in nearly everything we use. Of the approximately 7.21 billion barrels of total U.S. petroleum consumption in 2016, 47% was motor gasoline (includes ethanol), 20% was distillate fuel (heating oil and diesel fuel), and 8% was jet fuel.

Source EIA – https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=41&t=6

A partial list of products made from Petroleum (144 of 6000 items)

(A note to readers: This list came from a print publication in 1974. We failed to identify the source document and have been unable to find a list of the “6,000 items” since. In fact, since 1974 there have been hundreds of additional items replaced with plastic duplicates, medical syringes for example. So should you wish to find the complete list of products made from petroleum you will most likely have to compose it yourself.)

One 42-gallon barrel of oil creates 19.4 gallons of gasoline. The rest (over half) is used to make things like: