[thackney]

About 28% of all oil use is non-fuel in nature.

That sounds too high. Do you have a source for that information?

Petroleum Product Supplied http://eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/pet_cons_psup_dc_nus_mbblpd_m.htm

[IYAS9YAS]

That sounds too high. Do you have a source for that information?

Here's a decent chart that shows approximate percentages of what we get per barrel of oil.

Basically, a barrel of oil is 42 US gallons. There is a small production gain of approximately 2.2 gallons - so net product is 44.2 gallons from a barrel.

gasoline 19.5 (44.1%)
distillate fuel oil (Includes both home heating oil and diesel fuel) 9.2 - (20.8%)
kerosene-type jet fuel 4.1 (9.3%)
residual fuel oil (Heavy oils used as fuels in industry, marine transportation and for electric power generation) 2.3 (5.2%)
liquefied refinery gasses 1.9 (4.3%)
still gas 1.9 (4.3%)
coke 1.8 (4.1%)
asphalt and road oil 1.3 (2.9%)
petrochemical feedstocks 1.2 (2.7%)
lubricants 0.5 (1.1%)
kerosene 0.2 (0.5%)
other 0.3 (0.7%)

Off the top, fuel accounts for approximately 79.4% of use (gasoline, fuel oil, jet fuel, residual fuel oil). That leaves about 20.6% for non-fuel use.

[SaxxonWoods]

I’ll try to find it. Read that quite some time ago. There was a very long list attached of all the products made using oil, you now the drill, shoes, carpet, packaging, etc.

[SaxxonWoods]

At this site I find a figure of 14.4% for non-fuel use.

http://askville.amazon.com/percentage-oil-consumption-consumer-products-fuel/AnswerViewer.do?requestId=2317764

That’s 6 year-old information. I’m guessing current non-fuel use would be higher, but 28% does sound much too high given this information. This changes the math calc, but not the concept.

Thanks for the catch. I have submitted a question at http://www.petrostrategies.org/Learning_Center/oil_and_gas_basics.htm. I’ll report on their response.