Unveiling the Past: The Evolution of Oil Drilling from Ancient Times to Modern Exploration
The Evolution of Oil : We are making history every day , we reached the moon and making missions to the Mars and beyond. All thanks to the energy we created and using for the welfare of humankind. We can not imagine our life without electricity, transportation , industries and our daily needs . Our world runs on fossil fuels – including oil , coal and natural gas and without these we can not move forward.
The first Industrial Revolution started around 18th century to about 1830 and was mostly confined to Britain. The first Industrial Revolution was a period of global transition from creating goods by hand to using machine and human economy towards more widespread. For over 150 years , fossil fuels have been powering economies and currently supply about 80 percent of the world’s energy.
How fossil fuel made and its history
We all know that once on this earth , between 245 and 66 million years ago dinosaurs rule the world , according to the evidences dinosaurs extinct between the Cretaceous and Paleogene eras , about 66 million years ago an asteroid hit the earth , which is the main cause for extinction and due to the asteroid hit , volcanic eruption also caused large-scale climate change and many other changes have been involved. After extinction from the remains of carbon rich animals and plants, as they decomposed and were compressed and heated underground for millions of years , formed the fossil fuels.
What is the history of the oil drill
The first time oil well being drilled in China in 347 AD. They use oil in lamps or as a material for construction for thousands of years before the modern era. In 1859 , Colonel Edwin Drake discovered the oil at Oil Creek near Titusville , Pennsylvania and completed the first drilled oil well and this seems as the beginning of the morden oil era.
History of offshore drilling
Around 1891 , In Ohio , in the fresh waters of the Grand Lake St. Marys , the first submerged oil wells were drilled from platforms built on piles.
Around 1896 , In California , in the salt waters of the portions of Summerland field extending under the Santa Barbara Channel , the first submerged oil oil wells were drilled. Other notable drilling activities in history are -: In 1900 , Canadian side of Lake Erei
In 1901 , Caddo Lake in Louisiana
In 1920 , Lake Maracaibo in Venezuela
In 1923 , Bibi Eibat in Azerbaijan
Drilling Platforms
Depending on the water depth , offshore drilling is usually done from platforms broadly known as MODU(Mobile Offshore Drilling Units)
• Drillship
• Submersible drilling rig
• Semi-submersible platform
• Jackup rig
Top 10 main offshore fields
1. The North Sea
2. The Kara Sea north of Siberia
3. The Taranaki Basin in New Zealand
4. The Gulf of Mexico
5. California
6. The Caspian Sea
7. Major offshore oil fields in The Persian Gulf
8. Oil fields in India
9. The Campos and Santos Basin off the coasts of Brazil
10. Newfoundland and Nova Scotia in Atlantic Canada
What does the oil rig do
Oil rig or offshore drilling is a mechanical process of extracting petroleum from reserves located beneath the Earth’s ocean. In this process holes are drilled in the ocean seabed of the continental shelf and explore the oil , petroleum and natural gas reserves using a fixed or mobile platform located off the coast.
How are oil rigs built
Building an oil rig is a complicated and tough work , many years ago , oil rigs were stationary and extremely difficult to transport from one place to another. However , modern oil rigs are more mobile and can be easily transported from one location to another.
On an average , around two to three years are required to build oil rigs. To build Oil rigs require rigorous planning, cutting edge technology and professional team , which help to make a robust platform that can support the weight of the rig and withstand harsh weather conditions , the oil rigs are built at port cities and then towed out to sea to the desired destination.How do oil rigs work
The first step in the offshore drilling process is finding oil after that place the platform at the site and crew sets the rig up and slid into place by cantilever. Large diesel engines provide the main source of power and the drilling start pumping and sucking through pipes and hoses
How many oil rigs are there in the world
As the global oil demand is increasing so as the oil rigs are increasing , during the pandemic the demand decreases but after the pandemic oil demand recovered. According to the data , most of the oil rigs are located on land and at the end of 2022 , there were 1,532 operational onshore oil rigs , compared with 232 offshore rigs.What’s the biggest oil rig in the world
World’s first oil rig drilled in 1859 by Edwin Drake. Well , the world’s biggest oil rig is The Berkut oil rig , located off the Russian Pacific coast near the island of Sakhalin weighing approximately 200,000 tons and situated 35 meters from the seafloor and the annually maximum oil extraction capacity estimated is 4.5 million tons.
How deep is an oil rig
The deepest floating oil platform in the world at a water depth of about 8040 feet (2450 meters) and the platform is located in the Perdido(Spanish for lost) located in the Gulf of Mexico approximately 200 miles south of Galveston, Texas ,operated by Shell with JV partners Chevron(37.5%) and BP(27.5%).
Offshore oil rig companies
Top Offshore Drilling companies in the world
• ENSCO
• Saipem
• Diamond Offshore
• Cactus drilling company
• Baker Hughes
• Noble Corporation
• Jasper Offshore
• Valaris
• Schlumberger
• Nabors Offshore
• AKITA Drilling
• Halliburton
• Precision Drilling
• Fluor
• Weatherford
• Aban Offshore limited
• Petrofac
• Stena Drilling
• China Oilfield services
• Transocean
• Rowan
• Seadrill