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How much do you know about the oil and gas industry?
There are many aspects to this field, from the drilling and extraction process to the refining of petroleum products.
Oil and gas trivia questions can cover any of these topics and much more.
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With all the talk and oil and gas prices these days, it's time to see how much you really know about the industry with our oil and gas trivia questions.
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1. What is the name of the pipeline, built in the 1970s, that transports oil from fields near Prudhoe Bay across Alaska to the port city of Valdez?
Answer: Trans-Alaska Pipeline
2. The longest-term export between the U.S. and Japan is the shipping of LNG from Alaska. LNG stands for what type of cleaner-than-coal energy?
Answer: Liquefied Natural Gas
3. What is the name of the "well stimulation technique" in which rock is fractured by a pressurized liquid to create cracks in deep-rock formations through which natural gas or petroleum can escape? This process led to an industrial boom across parts of the Dakotas and Pennsylvania in the 2000s in the U.S.
Answer: Fracking
4. Hilcorp took over Alaska's massive Prudhoe Bay oil fields in 2019, after a sale by what massive London-based multinational oil and gas company?
Answer: BP
5. Diesel fuel originated from experiments for the compression-ignition engine invented in 1892 by Rudolf Diesel. What nationality was Mr. Diesel?
Answer: German
6. Some researchers believe that increased oil and gas production in what large basin, named for a geologic time period, has caused a marked increase in Texas earthquakes?
Answer: Permian Basin
7. In the common energy-related alphanumeric phrase of E85 that you might see at a gas station, what does the E stand for?
Answer: Ethanol
8. Although it is not publicly traded, what Middle Eastern oil company is often considered the most valuable company on earth? A long-discussed public offering has potentially been shelved.
Answer: Saudi Aramco
9. The four strokes of a gasoline engine are intake, compression, combustion, and what "E" stroke also known as "outlet?"
Answer: Exhaust
10. A large, double-sided sign featuring the logo of an oil company overlooks Kenmore Square in Boston. The sign was first installed in 1940 and most recently had its logo updated in 1965. What brand is represented on this sign?
Answer: Citgo
11. Samotolor Field and Romashkino Field are two of the largest oil fields in what expansive country?
Answer: Russia
12. Oil magnate Ellis Wyatt is one of the titans of industry who go missing in what 1957 novel by Ayn Rand?
Answer: Atlas Shrugged
13. In its full name, what two words, which allude to its national origins, begin the name of the oil and gas company Shell?
Answer: Royal Dutch
14. Which C-word refers to the equipment needed or the next steps that need to be taken to make a drilled well operational?
Answer: Completions
15. A 2016 film that dramatized the 2010 Deepwater Horizon incident starred what actor, formerly known as the singer "Marky Mark," in the role of electronics technician Mike Williams?
Answer: Mark Wahlberg
16. “The Smartest Guys in the Room” is the byline of a 2005 documentary film about the collapse of what American company after it became embroiled in one of the biggest insider trading corporate scandals of all time?
Answer: Enron
17. Octan is a fictional company whose gas stations appear in the building sets of what Danish toy brand?
Answer: Lego
18. In 1989, a ship hit a reef in the Prince William Sound and spilled more than 10 million gallons of crude oil over more than 1,000 miles of coastline. What was the famous, ill-fated two-word name of this ship?
Answer: Exxon Valdez
19. Halliburton is one of the largest oil field service companies in the world. Although the company is technically American, it has dual headquarters in Houston and what city outside of the U.S.?
Answer: Dubai
20. Although Austria is not a member, OPEC's headquarters are located in what world capital city?
Answer: Vienna
21. What “A” word applies to an oil well that is dug to determine the likely production rate of a field? This word is also used to describe things like an evaluation of how much a house is worth.
Answer: Appraisal Well
22. The name of which liquid that is derived from petroleum and widely used to power jet engines, originates from the Greek for “wax?”
Answer: Kerosene
23. Petrobras is the common name of a government-owned energy conglomerate in what South American country?
Answer: Brazil
24. What feline-sounding term is typically used to describe an exploratory gas or oil well? The term dates all the way back to newspaper articles from the 1870s. The term could also be used to describe a student at the University of Arizona.
Answer: Wildcat
25. Learning from World War I, the Germans famously stockpiled ample oil and gasoline as supplies for what "lightning war" method of warfare employed in WWII?
Answer: Blitzkrieg
26. When viewing the composition of petroleum by weight, what chemical makes up the majority?
Answer: Carbon
27. The Anglo-Persian Oil Company was founded in 1908 following the discovery of a large oil field in Masjed Soleiman, Iran. Now associated with Deepwater Horizon, by what name is this company known today?
Answer: BP
28. What is the name of the sedimentary rock formation that is the source of the fracking that has taken off in Pennsylvania, New York, and West Virginia?
Answer: Marcellus
29. The massive flow of Russia's Druzhba pipeline gets fed by oil from Siberia, the Urals, and what caviar-ish, C.S. Lewis-approved sea?
Answer: Caspian Sea
30. Paraffin and lamp oil are alternative terms for what combustible hydrocarbon liquid derived from petroleum?
Answer: Kerosene
31. What Western Australian city is the center of Australia's oil and gas industry, with the largest concentration of global oil and gas companies, and oil service companies in Australia?
Answer: Perth
32. Before aiding Seattle in opening its first, and the United States’ first, gas station in 1907, Standard Oil was founded 37 years prior by Henry Flagler and what American mogul, magnate, and philanthropist?
Answer: John D. Rockefeller
33. What Oklahoma city in Payne County is considered the Pipeline Crossroads of the World due to its status as a price settlement point for the New York Mercantile Exchange?
Answer: Cushing
34. A single notice of violation kickstarted the Volkswagen scandal known as "dieselgate." An agency from what country issued this first notice in 2015? As a hint, it wasn't Volkswagen's home country of Germany.
Answer: United States
35. Rudolf Christian Karl Diesel was a 19th century inventor and mechanical engineer, most famous for the invention of his namesake engine. He's also well-known for a suspicious death at sea. Although born in France, Diesel was what nationality?
Answer: German
36. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) is an intergovernmental organization founded in September 1960 at a conference in what country?
Answer: Iraq
37. When referring to the metric used to combined oil and natural gas reserves into one number, what does BOE stand for?
Answer: Barrels of Oil Equivalent
38. What Republican politician served as CEO and Chairman of oil giant Halliburton from 1995 to 2000?
Answer: Dick Cheney
39. What company has the largest reserve of liquid oil in the world?
Answer: Saudi Aramco
40. In the past 100 years of pricing for crude oil, the peak price was in what year?
Answer: 2008
41. One known carcinogen within gasoline is the compound benzene, which is composed of carbon and what other element?
Answer: Hydrogen
42. What is the name of the tall pipe that burns off excess gas from a petroleum refinery? This signal often appears as a visible flame.
Answer: Flare
43. Both Exxon and Mobil are "descendant" companies of what former company that was forced to disband in 1911?
Answer: Standard Oil
44. What Norwegian "E" company was previously known as Statoil and StatoilHydro?
Answer: Equinor
45. What energy company describes its logo on its own website as follows? "The colors of the Helios, named after the Greek god of the sun, suggest heat, light, and nature. It is also a pattern of interlocking shapes."
Answer: BP
46. In 1859 the first successful drilling of an oil well was near Oil Creek in the city of Titusville. In what U.S. state did this event occur?`
Answer: Pennsylvania
47. What "b" term in the drilling industry means "a sudden, uncontrolled release of underground pressure from the well" and is also a hair styling technique involving the flattening and straightening of hair?
Answer: Blowout
48. In the common benchmark within oil futures of WTI Crude Oil, what does the WTI stand for?
Answer: West Texas Intermediate
49. Appropriately, what gasoline brand has a circular logo containing a single star and a red letter T?
Answer: Texaco
50. What gasoline brand shares its name with a mark that can be used to indicate rank on the uniform of a military or police officer?
Answer: Chevron
51. In 2002, a “C” oil company based in Utah, and a “P” Petroleum Company based in Oklahoma merged to form what Houston oil conglomerate? The name is one word, the two former companies pressed together.
Answer: ConocoPhillips
52. What “C” petroleum company, founded in 1950 in Houston, Texas, with Joe Gatto as its current president, uses a logo where its name is in big blue letters, with the word “petroleum” in little red letters underneath?
Answer: Callon
53. What K-word means solid, insoluble organic matter found in sedimentary rock that, when heated, can yield oil or natural gas?
Answer: Kerogen
54. In October 1973, many members of OPEC placed an oil embargo on the United States, Canada, Japan, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom due to their support for Israel in what Middle Eastern conflict?
Answer: Yom Kippur War
55. What “C” term from oil piping refers to heavy steel pipe used to seal off fluids from the hole, or to keep the hole from caving in?
Answer: Casing
56. In petroleum production, an assembly of valves, casing spools, and fittings used to regulate the flow of pipes in an oil well may be known by what Yule-appropriate name?
Answer: Christmas Tree
57. In what 1999 film starring Pierce Brosnan as 007 does Bond thwart an attempt to increase petroleum prices by triggering a nuclear meltdown in the waters of Istanbul?
Answer: The World Is Not Enough
58. In 1821, William Hart dug the first well in the United States to specifically produce natural gas along the banks of the Canadaway Creek in the town of Fredonia in what state?
Answer: New York
59. What is the name of the tallest compliant tower in the world, finished in 2000, standing in the Gulf of Mexico at a whopping 640 meters tall, and operated by Chevron?
Answer: Petronius
60. Who was nicknamed "The Prophet of Spindletop" for his work in the Texas oil business? He leased the land on Sour Hill Mound to Anthony Lucas for drilling, resulting in the gusher that changed the oil industry.
Answer: Patillo Higgins
61. In the 19th century, gasoline was no more than crude oil waste. Most American refineries were really after which combustible hydrocarbon liquid (good for lamps)?
Answer: Kerosene
62. A field that holds more than 500 million barrels of oil, such as Alaska's Prudhoe Bay, may be known by what animalistic nine-letter term?
Answer: Elephant
63. Said to represent upwards of 600 companies in the United States, the API is the largest association for the oil and natural gas industry. What does API stand for?
Answer: American Petroleum Institute
64. Which part of a marine drilling platform that provides an opening to the water below also sounds like a place you’d go swimming in outer space? Some call it “wet porch”.
Answer: Moon Pool
65. Which chemical (CH₃OH, also known as wood alcohol) produces invisible flames and no smoke when it’s lit on fire?
Answer: Methanol
66. Brent crude oil, a benchmark against which other crude grades are priced, gets its name from the Brent field, an oil and gas field located in which sea between Scotland and Norway?
Answer: The North Sea
67. The Bolivar Coastal Fields, the largest oil field outside the Middle East, is located on the edge of Lake Maracaibo in which country, the world's fifth largest oil exporter?
Answer: Venezuela
68. A mysterious organization uses searching for oil as a cover for damming Bolivia's water supply in what 2008 James Bond film that starred Daniel Craig as 007 and Olga Kurylenko as his love interest?
Answer: Quantum of Solace
69. Every oil or gas well drilled in the United States gets a number assigned to it by which trade association?
Answer: American Petroleum Institute
70. If you’re trying to guide your drilling tools into the top of a well, what’s the jingly, vaguely naughty-sounding term for the pipe on top of the casing string that will be helpful?
Answer: Bell Nipple
71. The history of the petroleum industry in the U.S. starts with a man named David Beaty who discovered what in his home in Pennsylvania in 1875?
Answer: Crude oil
72. CNG is a form of fuel used in transportation that is largely comprised of methane. What do the letters CNG stand for?
Answer: Compressed Natural Gas
73. Gazprom might well be the largest natural gas company in the world according to 2019 data. At the very least, it’s definitely the largest company (by sales, with revenue topping $120,000,000,000) in which country?
Answer: Russia
74. Which term that sounds like a flowing body of water refers to the different levels of operation in the petroleum industry—that is, “up,” “mid,” and “down?”
Answer: Stream
75. Natural gas that is produced from reservoir rocks with low permeability, requiring hydraulic fracturing to make the well profitable, is often referred to by what stretched-sounding adjective?
Answer: Tight
76. In the 1990s, the United Nations established the Oil-for-Food Program to allow what Middle Eastern nation to sell enough oil to pay for food and necessities without expanding its military program?
Answer: Iraq
77. Which potato-y term refers to the starting point of drilling a well?
Answer: Spud
78. Coal and oil are two examples of which type of fuel that forms when dead stuff in the Earth breaks down over millions of years because it’s under heat and pressure?
Answer: Fossil
79. What’s the canine-inspired name for a space off the rig floor that can be used as an office or for storage?
Answer: Doghouse
80. Which type of well is drilled to get to pockets of oil that the original wells in an area may have missed or just make the overall recovery more efficient?
Answer: Infill
81. With a population of over 200 million, which West African country is by far the most populous member of OPEC?
Answer: Nigeria
82. "Why Global Human Flourishing Requires More Oil, Coal, and Natural Gas—Not Less" is the subtitle of what alliteratively named nonfiction bestseller by Alex Epstein?
Answer: Fossil Future
83. In the 2007 film "There Will Be Blood," Daniel Day-Lewis earned a Best Actor Oscar playing an oilman whose memorable lines included "I drink your" what sweet beverage-slash-dessert?
Answer: Milkshake
84. Critically panned but liked by audiences, "Gasoline Alley" is a 2022 film that marked the comeback of what "Die Hard" action movie star?
Answer: Bruce Willis
85. What is the only member of OPEC on the continent of South America?
Answer: Venezuela
86. What "P" component of crude oil is a word that was also once used to mean any alkane, and may be used in British English to mean kerosene specifically?
Answer: Paraffin
87. Which independent oil and gas company based in New York City was started by a 19-year-old entrepreneur in New Jersey who bought a second-hand truck to deliver oil in 1933?
Answer: Hess
88. In 2020, Texas-based Noble Energy was acquired by which global oil industry leader for around $5 billion?
Answer: Chevron
89. Which enormous tension-leg oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico peaked around 2000, when it was producing over 150,000 barrels of oil per day?
Answer: Ursa
90. Founded in 1976, PDVSA is a state-owned petroleum corporation that belongs to what South American nation?
Answer: Venezuela
91. Analogous to the term "mineral" used to describe inorganic rocks, what "M" word means any of the distinct individual constituents of coal, such as vitrinite or liptinite?
Answer: Maceral
92. Which rig located off the coast of Russia and Japan near Sakhalin Island is the largest oil platform in the world as of 2023, weighing over 42,000 tons?
Answer: Berkut
93. According to the IUPAC naming systems and convention, the gas butane contains how many carbon atoms in each of its molecules?
Answer: Four
94. Found in crude petroleum and natural gas, what is the common name of the three-carbon alkane with the chemical formula C₃H₆?
Answer: Propane
95. The intergovernmental organization OPEC was founded in 1960 in Baghdad. What does the E in OPEC stand for?
Answer: Exporting
96. Eventually acquired by Standard Oil, what oil company was founded in 1911 by Walter Fondren and the Sterling brothers, and was named after the modest-sounding Texas town in which it was founded?
Answer: Humble Oil
97. Higher octane gas leads to less premature ignition which in turn reduces the rattling noise in cars most commonly known by what "K" term?
Answer: Knocking
98. Black Gold was a reality TV series chronicling three oil drilling rigs in Andrews County in what state? The show was partly produced by Thom Beers, creator of Deadliest Catch and Ice Road Truckers.
Answer: Texas
99. Founded in 2009 to combine expertise in fuels and industrial biotechnology, Butamax is a joint venture between BP and what Delaware-based chemical company?
Answer: DuPont
100. What is the watery-sounding name for an underground layer of liquid-bearing permeable rock that is occasionally used as a seasonal storage place for thermal energy?
Answer: Aquifer
101. What Northern Alaska town is adjacent to and the namesake of the largest oilfield in the United States, and is the unofficial northern terminus of the Pan-American highway?
Answer: Prudhoe Bay
102. Consisting chiefly of hydrocarbons, what sticky black substance also known as "bitumen" is found in natural beds or made as a residue of petroleum refinement?
Answer: Asphalt
103. A large green brontosaurus with the decidedly uncreative name of Dino is the mascot for what gasoline brand?
Answer: Sinclair
104. Variously featuring a brontosaurus or T.Rex in its logo, what is the six-letter name of the fictional company whose gas stations appear in Pixar's "Toy Story" and "Cars" franchises?
Answer: Dinoco
105. What “S” oilfield service and equipment company was founded by French brothers Conrad and Marcel in 1926, and named after their last name? They are now a global corporation with headquarters in the US, UK, Netherlands, and Curacao.
Answer: Schlumberger
106. In the name of that partly completed Keystone XL pipeline, XL doesn't stand for "extra large." The L stands for "limited," and the X stands for what E-word?
Answer: Export
107. What is the name of the "Island" which had a famous nuclear accident with a radiation leak in Pennsylvania in 1979?
Answer: Three Mile Island
108. Including a container for a brewed beverage, what is the name of the scandal that rocked the Harding administration in the 1920s, involving bribery to obtain leases of Navy petroleum reserves without competitive bidding?
Answer: Teapot Dome
109. Total S.A. is a multinational integrated oil and gas company founded in 1924 and headquartered in what European country?
Answer: France
110. What is the term commonly used to refer to the act of deviating a wellbore to head in a different, desired angle?
Answer: Directional Drilling
111. Sometimes nicknamed a “wildcat well,” which term applies to the (risky) practice of drilling in an area that isn’t known to be an oilfield (but hey, it might be!)?
Answer: Exploration
112. What soft-sounding term refers to the volume of natural gas intended as permanent inventory in a storage reservoir to maintain adequate pressure and deliverability in the reservoir?
Answer: Cushion Gas
113. What "T" compound, chemical formula C₇H₈, consists of a benzene ring with a CH₃ group in place of one of the hydrogen atoms and is found naturally in crude oil?
Answer: Toluene
114. Founded in 1910, Cities Service, a company that supplied fuel to public utilities, was the precursor to what energy company, whose name of origin is reflected in its name today?
Answer: Citgo
115. Arbusto Energy was a small oil exploration company founded in 1977. Within a few years, the company changed its name to reflect the surname of what famous man?
Answer: George W Bush
116. With over 500 million barrels produced in 2019, what Great Plains state has the second-largest crude oil production after Texas?
Answer: North Dakota
117. What is the name of the region with large deposits of bitumen (heavy crude oil) in the northeastern region of Alberta? This is the largest known reservoir of bitumen on Earth.
Answer: Athabasca oil sands
118. James Dean wore a cowboy hat and got slathered in oil in what epic 1956 film that earned him his second and final Oscar nomination?
Answer: Giant
119. What gasoline brand issued the first toy version of its iconic green, yellow, and white toy tanker trucks in 1964?
Answer: Hess
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