With the amount of oil that we remove from the ground, how does the surface of the earth not collapse in on itself, especially when we exhaust the supply of oil?
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Oil is usually found from a few hundred feet to a few thousand feet below the ground. The deepest wells are 20000 to 30,000 ft, although that’s uncommon. That’s about 5 miles, or 7.6km.
By contrast, the crust of the earth is about 5 to 70 km, and the mantle goes to about 2900 km. So the oil we’re drilling is very close to the surface, and very far from many structural parts of the planet.
Think cutting off the tip of your fingernail – it won’t cause your hand to fall off.
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