Oil is one of those things that everybody needs and very few people have. It is a dwindling resource in the grand scheme of things. And that is why you have probably heard all over the news the different stories about peak oil and about how the constant search for oil causes governments to do some pretty crazy things. Although some of these stories can be a bit conspiratorial, there is certainly truth to the fact that oil is a critical resource and governments know that. And as history can so clearly show us, wars are fought over critical resources all the time. In fact, almost every single war in history boiled down to being a conflict over resources, whether those resources were land and people or things like coastlines and sources of food. These days are no different. The world is still shaped by its pursuit of limited supplies. Don’t get us wrong though, oil is not a bad thing. Ever since the dawn of civilization people have used oil in various ways. It has played a significant role in creating the society that we have today. These are 25 things you probably didn’t know about gas and oil.
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Thomas Midgley, a chemist, was responsible for the idea of including lead in gasoline to prevent knocking in engines. Some say this discovery is single-handedly responsible for more environmental damage than anything else in the world.
Source: wikipedia, Image: wikipedia The price of gasoline in the US is half the price of gasoline in the EU.
Source: wikipedia, Image: wikipedia During World War I, planes used Castor Oil as engine lubricant. Because of un-burnt Castor Oil coming out of the exhaust, pilots often suffered diarrhea.
Source: wikipedia, Image: wikipedia America gets more of its oil from Canada and Mexico than it gets from the entire Middle East combined.
Source: environmentaltrends.org, Image: wikipedia Statoil, a Norwegian oil company, sold one of their platforms with the following message - "Well kept 20 bedroom platform for sale. Panorama sea view and plenty of room for a helicopter."
Source: statoil.com, Image: wikipedia 
