how crude oil is extracted
Split and merge into it. Answer by 06jcoxon. Confidence votes 42. Crude oil is extracted by drilling wells, but oil sand deposits are strip mined or made to flow into producing wells by in situ techniques which reduce the bitumen's viscosity with steam and/or solvents.
Drilling. Pumping crude oil out of the ground through a pipe has remained the basic idea behind crude oil extraction since the earliest drill sites. However, while the first drilling technique stuck a pipe straight into the ground, modern drillers now have slant drilling techniques.