Most of the oil wells are drilled in remote locations and after these wells start to produce, crude oil needs to be transported to refineries where it can be converted to more useful products such as fuels and other petrochemicals.
Crude oil may also need to be transported to storage facilities before it’s sent to refineries.
There are 4 main ways to transport crude oil: trucks, oil tankers (ships), trains, and pipelines.
The location of the wells will often dictate how oil is transported.
All the types of crude oil transport that we will discuss have their own advantages and disadvantages.
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4 Ways to Transport Crude Oil
1. Oil Tankers
In places where there is easy access to marine shipping routes tankers are often used.
For example in the Middle East or in the North Sea.
When oil needs to be transported over large distances of water, using oil tankers is the only viable option.
Transporting oil by ship is cheaper than using rail or trucks.
However, there is a risk of spills in case of accidents.
There is also a chance of sabotage when transporting crude oil close to politically unstable regions.
When it comes to speed, oil tankers are usually pretty slow in comparison to all other oil transportation methods.
2. Pipelines
Using pipelines is the most convenient, safest, and energy-efficient way to transport crude oil.
However, building new pipelines is a complicated and expensive process.
There are also a lot of different regulations when it comes to building new pipelines.
Pipelines are often portrayed in a negative light on the news because of oil spills.
However, they are the safest way to transport oil in comparison to all other transportation methods.
Newer pipelines are usually very effective at preventing spills.
There are both onshore and offshore pipelines.
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3. Trucks
Trucks are usually used when there is no other way to transport oil.
One example might be transporting crude from remote leases with no infrastructure.
However, using trucks is also the most energy-consuming way to transport crude oil.
There is also an increased risk of accidents because a large number of trucks is required due to the limited capacity of each vehicle.
Trucks are also often used to transport final products such as gasoline and diesel to fuel stations.
4. Rail
Transporting crude oil by rail is a good alternative to using trucks when there is no access to pipelines.
Because the rail is already built, adding additional capacity is relatively cheap which makes rail quite a flexible option when there is a surge in oil production.
However one of the disadvantages is that the refinery is not always located close to the rail and oil might need to be delivered by trucks for the final leg of its journey.
Similar to all other oil transportation methods, rail is not immune to spills that happen when the train derails.
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References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroleum_transport