2006-07-02 14:09:17 · 11 answers · asked by funpeace1127 1 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Earth Sciences & Geology
It was sort of an accident of nature. The modern day Middle East was an east-west oriented sea during the Mesozoic and early mid Cenozoic eras (roughly 10 million to 100 million years plus ago). This ancient seaway is called the Tethys Sea by geologists.
During the late Mesozoic and early Cenozoic eras, the Tethys Sea was located at around 20 degrees north latitude. This regional belt has always had a very warm climate.
A very large amount of limestone was deposited on the bottom of the warm shallow seas. The limestone is highly fractured. The oil migrated upward from older rocks. The reason that the oil is trapped in the limestone is that overlying the limestone are large deposits of impermeable salt and anhydrite. The salt and anhydrite trapped the oil, which collected in the fractures and cave-like openings of the limestone. Some of this limestone is so porous and filled with openings that wells produces as much as 100,000 barrels of oil in a day. These geological conditions are unique for the world.
When geological changes occurred, the Tethys seaway closed in the late Cenozoic Era, when the rocks of the Middle East were compressed into folds. Much of the residual oil accumulated in the crests of anticlines. This event occurred at the time when the mountains of Iran and Iraq formed (the Zagros and Elburz Ranges) were created.
2006-07-02 14:13:39 · answer #1 · answered by xxiangel 2 · 2⤊ 0⤋
The real answer is a lesson in geology, but if I recall the dumb Irish joke about why the Irish got the potatoes and Arabs got all the oil the punchline was:
The Irish got first pick.
2006-07-02 14:40:16 · answer #2 · answered by Patrick M 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Basically wherever there are large pockets of oil, there was a large extinction of species from which the petroleum is created.
2006-07-02 14:15:11 · answer #3 · answered by sunnyjay 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
i am pretty sure it was because of the Tethys Seaway and all the life which inhabited it - dead life sinks to the bottom and is buried in sediment - after years of pressure and heat their bodies begin to break down and eventually mature into oil
2006-07-02 16:35:19 · answer #4 · answered by Brian 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The ragheads went all Jihad on the dinosaurs and their dead bodies made all the oil!
2006-07-02 14:24:31 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
God blesses the weak nations to humble the strong
this is basic bible principle seen throughout scriptures
2006-07-02 14:13:44 · answer #6 · answered by public response 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
because that's where oil comes from
2006-07-02 14:16:55 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
it once was a swampy world full of vegitation and dinosaurs, those things, long dead, is what makes both oil and coal.
2006-07-02 19:51:22 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
because of the diluvium
2006-07-02 14:12:23 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
maybe de lands dere were heavily forested..
2006-07-02 14:14:10 · answer #10 · answered by baboon 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋