In this blog post, we’ll explore how the household products we use every day—such as shampoo, cosmetics, and detergents—are derived from petroleum, and trace the long journey petroleum takes to reach our daily lives.
Shampoo, cosmetics, and detergents. These are essential products in our daily lives, and together they provide us with cleanliness and convenience. Shampoo washes away the fatigue of the day; cosmetics conceal skin imperfections and boost our confidence; and detergents keep our clothes and homes clean. We take their existence for granted. Without these products, our daily lives would be vastly different. They keep us clean and help us look our best. They turn clothes stained with grime white, naturally conceal dark blemishes, and breathe new life into our hair. If we were to describe them in terms of color, we could say they are what transforms black into white and bright.
But would you believe it if I told you that these products actually started out as black? A significant number of the products we use every day are made from petrochemical products derived from petroleum. This fact may come as a surprise at first. Fewer people than you might think realize that petroleum is the starting point for the products that make our lives convenient and beautiful. However, without petroleum, our lives would be vastly different from what they are today; in modern society, petroleum is more than just a resource—it is a vital foundation that sustains our civilization.
Oil is not merely a raw material for products; it is a core resource that underpins modern civilization. It serves as the fuel that powers cars, the energy that runs factories, and the driving force behind global industry and the economy. When we consider that countless products we use every day are derived from oil, we are reminded once again of its importance. So where exactly does oil—the starting point for so many products—come from, and what process does it undergo to reach us? Let’s follow that journey step by step.
First, let’s examine the process by which oil is formed. It’s easy to confuse the terms “oil well,” “crude oil,” and “petroleum,” but they have distinct meanings. An oil well refers to a facility drilled to extract crude oil from underground, while crude oil refers to petroleum in its raw state as extracted from the ground. Crude oil then undergoes a refining process to be transformed into various petroleum products such as gasoline, diesel, kerosene, jet fuel, lubricants, and naphtha. So, let’s first examine how crude oil is formed and how it reaches us.
Crude oil is formed when organic matter—such as marine organisms and microorganisms that lived in past geological eras—accumulates in sedimentary layers and is subjected to high pressure and temperatures of approximately 60–150°C over tens of millions of years. This process is a marvelous result of nature over a long period of time, and crude oil is often referred to as the Earth’s “liquid gold.” The crude oil formed in this way is stored deep underground or in subsea strata. Now, there is only one remaining question: How do we extract the crude oil from deep underground? Simply put, it involves drilling through the strata with drilling equipment and connecting pipes to produce the crude oil. However, since a significant portion of the world’s crude oil is produced from offshore oil fields, this process is by no means easy.
Nevertheless, South Korea’s outstanding shipbuilding technology has established global competitiveness even in this field of offshore development. South Korea’s shipbuilding industry has led the global market by constructing state-of-the-art offshore drilling vessels such as drillships. Drillships are generally large vessels measuring approximately 200–250 meters in length and 35–45 meters in width; their role is to drill into the seabed and connect pipes to the oil-bearing strata. However, the drilling process is by no means straightforward. Imagine trying to dig a hole in the sandbox at a playground. You can dig down fairly well at first, but as you continue to dig deeper, the sand on the sides begins to collapse. The seabed is no different. Therefore, once drilling reaches a certain depth, steel casing is installed to prevent the hole from collapsing, and cement is injected between the casing and the rock layer to secure it firmly in place. These operations—drilling, casing, and cementing—are considered the most fundamental and critical processes in offshore drilling. By repeating this process, we eventually reach the geological formation where the crude oil we’re seeking is buried.
