Kerosene
Kerosene, or paraffin, is a combustible hydrocarbon liquid which is derived from petroleum. It is widely used as a fuel in aviation as well as households. Its name derives from the Greek meaning "wax"; it was registered as a trademark by Nova Scotia geologist and inventor Abraham Gesner in 1854 before evolving into a generic trademark. It is sometimes spelled kerosine in scientific and industrial usage.
Kerosene is widely used to power jet engines of aircraft, as well as some rocket engines in a highly refined form called RP-1. It is also commonly used as a cooking and lighting fuel, and for fire toys such as poi. In parts of Asia, kerosene is sometimes used as fuel for small outboard motors or even motorcycles. World total kerosene consumption for all purposes is equivalent to about 5,500,000 barrels per day as of July 2023.
The term "kerosene" is common in much of Argentina, Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand, Nigeria, and the United States, while the term paraffin is used in Chile, East Africa, South Africa, Norway, and the United Kingdom. The term "lamp oil", or the equivalent in the local languages, is common in the majority of Asia and the Southeastern United States, although in Appalachia, it is also commonly referred to as "coal oil".
The name "paraffin" is also used to refer to a number of distinct petroleum byproducts other than kerosene. For instance, liquid paraffin is a more viscous and highly refined product which is used as a laxative. Paraffin wax is a waxy solid extracted from petroleum.
To prevent confusion between kerosene and the much more flammable and volatile gasoline, some jurisdictions regulate markings or colourings for containers used to store or dispense kerosene. For example, in the United States, Pennsylvania requires that portable containers used at retail service stations for kerosene be colored blue, as opposed to red or yellow.
The World Health Organization considers kerosene to be a polluting fuel and recommends that "governments and practitioners immediately stop promoting its household use". Kerosene smoke contains high levels of harmful particulate matter, and household use of kerosene is associated with higher risks of cancer, respiratory infections, asthma, tuberculosis, cataracts, and adverse pregnancy outcomes.
Properties and grades
Kerosene is a low-viscosity, clear liquid formed from hydrocarbons obtained from the fractional distillation of petroleum between, resulting in a mixture with a density of 0.78–0.81 g/cm3. It is miscible with petroleum solvents, but not with water. It is composed of hydrocarbon molecules that typically contain between 6 and 20 carbon atoms per molecule, predominantly containing 9 to 16 carbon atoms.Regardless of crude oil source or processing history, kerosene's major components are branched- and straight-chain alkanes and naphthenes, which normally account for at least 70% of volume. Aromatic hydrocarbons such as alkylbenzenes and alkylnaphthalenes, do not normally exceed 25% by volume of kerosene streams. Olefins are usually not present at more than 5% by volume.
The heat of combustion of kerosene is similar to that of diesel fuel; its lower heating value is 43.1 MJ/kg, and its higher heating value is.
ASTM International recognizes two grades of kerosene: 1-K and 2-K. Grade 1-K kerosene burns cleaner with fewer deposits, fewer toxins, and less frequent maintenance than 2-K, and is the preferred grade for indoor heaters and stoves.
In the United Kingdom, two grades of heating oil are defined. BS 2869 Class C1 is the lightest grade used for lanterns, camping stoves, and wick heaters, and mixed with petrol in some vintage combustion engines as a substitute for tractor vaporizing oil. BS 2869 Class C2 is a heavier distillate, which is used as domestic heating oil. Premium kerosene is usually sold in 5- or 20-litre containers from hardware, camping and garden stores, and is often dyed purple. Standard kerosene is usually dispensed in bulk by a tanker and is undyed.
National and international standards define the properties of several grades of kerosene used for jet fuel. Flash point and freezing point properties are of particular concern for operation and safety; the standards also define additives for control of static electricity and other purposes.
Melting, freeze and flash points
Kerosene is liquid around room temperature:. The flash point of kerosene is between and, and its autoignition temperature is. The freezing point of kerosene depends on grade, with commercial aviation fuel standardized at.Grade 1-K kerosene freezes around −40 °C.
File: Al-RaziInGerardusCremonensis1250.JPG|thumb|upright|Persian scholar Rāzi was the first to distil kerosene in the ninth century. He is depicted here in a manuscript by Gerard of Cremona.
History
The process of distilling crude oil/petroleum into kerosene, as well as other hydrocarbon compounds, was first written about in the ninth century by the Persian scholar Rāzi. In his Kitab al-Asrar, the physician and chemist Razi described two methods for the production of kerosene, termed naft abyad, using an apparatus called an alembic. One method used clay as an absorbent, and later the other method using chemicals like ammonium chloride. The distillation process was repeated until most of the volatile hydrocarbon fractions had been removed and the final product was perfectly clear and safe to burn. Kerosene was also produced during the same period from oil shale and bitumen by heating the rock to extract the oil, which was then distilled. During the Chinese Ming Dynasty, the Chinese made use of kerosene through extracting and purifying petroleum and then converted it into lamp fuel. The Chinese made use of petroleum for lighting lamps and heating homes as early as 1500 BC.Illuminating oil from coal and oil shale
Although "coal oil" was well known by industrial chemists at least as early as the 1700s as a byproduct of making coal gas and coal tar, it burned with a smoky flame that prevented its use for indoor illumination. In cities, much indoor illumination was provided by piped-in coal gas, but outside the cities, and for spot lighting within the cities, the lucrative market for fueling indoor lamps was supplied by whale oil, specifically that from sperm whales, which burned brighter and cleaner.Canadian geologist Abraham Pineo Gesner claimed that in 1846, he had given a public demonstration in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island of a new process he had discovered. He heated coal in a retort, and distilled from it a clear, thin fluid that he showed made an excellent lamp fuel. He coined the name "kerosene" for his fuel, a contraction of keroselaion, meaning wax-oil. The cost of extracting kerosene from coal was high.
Gesner recalled from his extensive knowledge of New Brunswick's geology a naturally occurring asphaltum called albertite. He was blocked from using it by the New Brunswick coal conglomerate because they had coal extraction rights for the province, and he lost a court case when their experts claimed albertite was a form of coal. In 1854, Gesner moved to Newtown Creek, Long Island, New York. There, he secured backing from a group of businessmen. They formed the North American Gas Light Company, to which he assigned his patents.
Despite clear priority of discovery, Gesner did not obtain his first kerosene patent until 1854, two years after James Young's United States patent. Gesner's method of purifying the distillation products appears to have been superior to Young's, resulting in a cleaner and better-smelling fuel. Manufacture of kerosene under the Gesner patents began in New York in 1854 and later in Boston—being distilled from bituminous coal and oil shale. Gesner registered the word "Kerosene" as a trademark in 1854, and for several years, only the North American Gas Light Company and the Downer Company were allowed to call their lamp oil "Kerosene" in the United States.
In 1848, Scottish chemist James Young experimented with oil discovered seeping in a coal mine as a source of lubricating oil and illuminating fuel. When the seep became exhausted, he experimented with the dry distillation of coal, especially the resinous "boghead coal". He extracted a number of useful liquids from it, one of which he named paraffine oil because at low temperatures, it congealed into a substance that resembled paraffin wax. Young took out a patent on his process and the resulting products in 1850, and built the first truly commercial oil-works in the world at Bathgate in 1851, using oil extracted from locally mined torbanite, shale, and bituminous coal. In 1852, he took out a United States patent for the same invention. These patents were subsequently upheld in both countries in a series of lawsuits, and other producers were obliged to pay him royalties.
Kerosene from petroleum
In 1851, Samuel Martin Kier began selling lamp oil to local miners, under the name "Carbon Oil". He distilled this from crude oil by a process of his own invention. He also invented a new lamp to burn his product. He has been dubbed the Grandfather of the American Oil Industry by historians. Kier's salt wells began to be fouled with petroleum in the 1840s. At first, Kier simply dumped the oil into the nearby Pennsylvania Main Line Canal as useless waste, but later he began experimenting with several distillates of the crude oil, along with a chemist from eastern Pennsylvania.Ignacy Łukasiewicz, a Polish pharmacist residing in Lviv, and his partner had been experimenting with different distillation techniques, trying to improve on Gesner's kerosene process, but using oil from a local petroleum seep. Many people knew of his work, but paid little attention to it. On the night of 31 July 1853, doctors at the local hospital needed to perform an emergency operation, virtually impossible by candlelight. They therefore sent a messenger for Łukasiewicz and his new lamps. The lamp burned so brightly and cleanly that the hospital officials ordered several lamps plus a large supply of fuel. Łukasiewicz realized the potential of his work and quit the pharmacy to find a business partner, and then traveled to Vienna to register his technique with the government. Łukasiewicz moved to the Gorlice region of Poland in 1854, and sank several wells across southern Poland over the following decade, setting up a refinery near Jasło in 1859.
The petroleum discovery by Edwin Drake Drake Well in western Pennsylvania in 1859 caused a great deal of public excitement and investment drilling in new wells, not only in Pennsylvania, but also in Canada, where petroleum had been discovered at Oil Springs, Ontario in 1858, and southern Poland, where Ignacy Łukasiewicz had been distilling lamp oil from petroleum seeps since 1852. The increased supply of petroleum allowed oil refiners to entirely side-step the oil-from-coal patents of both Young and Gesner, and produce illuminating oil from petroleum without paying royalties to anyone. As a result, the illuminating oil industry in the United States completely switched over to petroleum in the 1860s. The petroleum-based illuminating oil was widely sold as Kerosene, and the trade name soon lost its proprietary status, and became the lower-case generic product "kerosene". Because Gesner's original Kerosene had been also known as "coal oil", generic kerosene from petroleum was commonly called "coal oil" in some parts of the United States well into the 20th century.
In the United Kingdom, manufacturing oil from coal continued into the early 20th century, although increasingly overshadowed by petroleum oils.
As kerosene production increased, whaling declined. The American whaling fleet, which had been steadily growing for 50 years, reached its all-time peak of 199 ships in 1858. By 1860, just two years later, the fleet had dropped to 167 ships. The Civil War cut into American whaling temporarily, but only 105 whaling ships returned to sea in 1866, the first full year of peace, and that number dwindled until only 39 American ships set out to hunt whales in 1876. Kerosene, made first from coal and oil shale, then from petroleum, had largely taken over whaling's lucrative market in lamp oil.
Electric lighting started displacing kerosene as an illuminant in the late 19th century, especially in urban areas. However, kerosene remained the predominant commercial end-use for petroleum refined in the United States until 1909, when it was exceeded by motor fuels. The rise of the gasoline-powered automobile in the early 20th century created a demand for the lighter hydrocarbon fractions, and refiners invented methods to increase their output of gasoline, while decreasing their output of kerosene. In addition, some of the heavier hydrocarbons that previously went into kerosene were incorporated into diesel fuel. Kerosene kept some market share by being increasingly used in stoves and portable heaters.