What Countries Consume the Most Oil?

The United States is the world's biggest oil consumer, followed by China, Japan and India. The 10 biggest oil consuming nations account for more than 58 percent of the world's total oil consumption per day.

Seeing these numbers reminds me of a very sobering fact I heard one time. There has been a lot of talk over the last decade or so of drilling for oil in the Arctic wilderness in Alaska. This is one of the largest pieces of undeveloped land anywhere in the world. Largely barren, sure, but still untouched by man.

They estimate that there are a billion barrels of oil in this part of the world. At first that sounds like a ton, but when you realize that the US goes through almost 20 million barrels a day you realize that drilling in Alaska would supply us with oil for 50 days, less than 2 months. Seems like a high price to pay to ruin one of the last unruined places on earth.

Aspirin is not an oil byproduct. Most aspirin have four ingredients: the active ingredient (acetylsalicylic acid), corn starch, water and a lubricant. Possible lubricants include: hydrogenated vegetable oil, stearic acid, talc, or aluminum stearate. They are used to keep pills from sticking to the machines that press the mixture of ingredients into hard tablets/pills.

As for the USA oil consumption, and China surpassing us, what percentage of the oil used in China is used to make products for the US? I wish we would at least start using solar power more often and take away the tax payers money going into the oil companies pockets on top of all the profit they make of us. Put that taxpayer money toward building the infrastructure for renewable energy!

britain uses the most oil in the world, not america.

Until a couple of years ago I hadn't given a second thought to the term 'carbon footprint'. Then I became a parent and everything changed. Once you have this real life investment in the future it's hard to not worry about what is going to be left of the world for your kids to enjoy.

There are many things we can do as individuals to reduce personal oil consumption. I don't buy plastic shopping bags, refuse to use aspirin (which is made from oil byproducts), and use natural rememdies for pest control.

It's easy to think we can't make any impact on change, but even a few small things can reduce oil consumption in the US, or any other country.

China passed the US in Oil consumption by 4 percent last year. An Article by WSJ from a report of the International Energy Agency indicates that China will continue to grow it's usage substantially every year.

@anon22233: Major suppliers are Canada and Venezuela. The

rest are from saudi arabia.

I used to ride my bike everywhere to save money and cut down on pollution until a careless driver ran me down. Five bicycle riders were killed in our city that one summer alone. It's almost like oil companies have their own hit men on the roads. And Secretaries of State will give a driver's license to just about anyone anymore.

The number of cars on the road have tripled since I was a kid. It's ridiculous, and something's got to give.

I say shame on our government for lying in bed with Big Oil. The chart above should make any American sick and shameful just looking at it. It proves how greedy and uncaring they really are about the environment.

Our poor mother Earth being destroyed by way too many pollutants. I hope someday she gets her revenge. And when someone even tries to do something good like ride a bike, some king of the road jerk comes along and runs you over.

Where does the United States get its oil from?

The fact that the US has lousy public transit systems and that it is not very safe to ride your bike in most US cities might have something to do with these ridiculous statistics! I live in the United States and would give up my car in a second if my city had anything resembling good public transportation or if I could ride my bike without getting killed. It's really sad that even though gas is expensive, traffic is horrible, our cars are polluting... we're still in them!