Oil as part of our daily life

OPEC Bulletin Commentary – March-April 2024

The OPEC Secretariat has been examining the question of what our world would look like if oil disappeared tomorrow, including with an article in this edition on the vital role it plays in our daily lives.

The truth is we do not think about how often oil touches our lives each day — from waking up to going to bed at night. From the moment our feet touch the floor after our first stretch, we are impacted by oil and its derivatives.

The homes we live in are likely heated or cooled, necessitating oil products, including if this is done with photovoltaic systems that require oil in their production. If you have tiles or wooden flooring as you step out of bed, the factories that made them would have required oil products on many fronts, from the machinery to the buildings, to temperature regulation and packaging.

Your regular morning hygiene routine requires toothpaste, a toothbrush, deodorant and shampoo, all of which are enclosed in plastic or made of it. Your bath mat may have plastic fibres, your laundry detergent is derived from petroleum-based products, and if you put in contact lenses or wear glasses, both require oil products.

In the kitchen, a breakfast of grains or fruit requires oil-driven agricultural mechanization to harvest, and perhaps plastic for transportation. Sitting down at a table, on a seat, with plates or utensils, again requires the use of oil products.

This continues with the clothes we wear for work or school, the bags or backpacks we carry things in, the personal items we put inside, brushes, combs, laptops and mobile phones. We depend on the use of oil-derived products for our daily commutes, with many of them used in the construction of the interiors of most forms of transport. Even electric vehicles require many plastic components and petroleum-based products to function.

At lunch, the foods we eat require agricultural machinery to produce, along with heating/cooling and likely some kind of plastic packaging. The drinks we consume often come from plastic bottles, and the restaurants we are seated at need all the contingent plastics and fuels that enable the business to function.

Then you take your car or public transportation home, relax on your couch when you get there, watching TV, surfing the Internet or reading a book. None of this would be possible without oil and its associated products.

If you, or someone in your family, has to go to visit the doctor or hospital regularly, there are plastics all around the facility. Latex gloves, medical tubes, medical syringes, adhesives, hand sanitizers, prosthetics, stethoscopes and MRI scanners are just a few products that rely on oil derivatives. Others can be life saving for many, such as artificial heart valves, resuscitation masks and insulin pens.

Perhaps you enjoy sports like biking, which has oil products in the tires, or kayaking and paddle-boarding, for which the equipment is mostly plastic in nature. Maybe you like a good hike – the soles of your shoes, if not a great deal of your clothes and equipment would be produced with the use of oil derivatives.

Before you go to bed at night, you may open your plastic framed window to air your room, you might pet your cat, which likely has an oil-derived toilet and bowl, as well as food produced in a factory. You might play a few games with the children, with equipment or toys that have plastic components.

It is then back to the bathroom and your hygiene routine, before you finally let out a sigh of relief to be in bed once again as you get into your pyjamas and lie on your bedding that both contain oil-derived fibres.

This is nowhere near an exhaustive list, but small examples of how oil affects our daily lives. It is why OPEC is strongly motivated to ensure that the world has enough oil to meet its needs, and at the same time, ensure we leverage technology solutions to reduce emissions and aid efficiency improvements.

We need to appreciate the immense benefits that oil, and the petroleum products derived from it, continue to provide to people and nations across the world.

OPEC Bulletin March-April 2024

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