• Petrol (Gasoline)

    • The hydrocarbon constituents in this boiling range are those that have 4–12 carbon atoms. Gasoline boils at about the same range as naphtha (a precursor to gasoline) but below kerosene.

    • Gasoline was at first produced by distillation, simply separating the volatile, more valuable fractions of crude petroleum, and was composed of the naturally occurring constituents of petroleum. Later processes, designed to raise the yield of gasoline from crude oil, split higher-molecular-weight constituents into lower-molecular-weight products by various cracking processes. Isomerization, alkylation, polymerization, and reforming are also used to produce gasoline.