I'm currently studying oil extraction and learned that the engines are powered by electricity or diesel. Probably there are other types of fuel used as well. By engines I mean the pumps that extract the oil from under the sea. My question is: Is the oil platform able to use the oil they are pumping to power their own engines? I believe it would need to be able to "transform" oil into fuel on site and use it, is that possible?
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Platforms are weight and space limited so there is generally no room for processing( and processing will require more crew and their facilities). Gas, oil and water are usually separated, often it is legal to dump the water, saves pipelining it to shore for processing. So a nat gas engine should be possible but I have not heard of them used on a platform. And it can require a complex of 2 or 3 platforms to separate gas, oil, and water. Especially in the US gulf, many platforms are unmanned and just send all production to shore. Some very productive deep water platforms will have a permanently anchored tanker which give more room for separating ,etc. They might separate out a diesel fraction, gasoline would be out of the question.
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