Barrels of Oil Equivalent to Kilograms of TNT

One BOE equals approximately 6.118 gigajoules, 1,700 kWh, or 5.8 million BTU. That is roughly the energy a US household uses in electricity over six weeks. The figure is a defined convention — actual crude oil barrels vary by 5–10% depending on whether it is light sweet crude or heavy sour crude.

Because modern energy companies produce oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids. Reporting everything in BOE allows investors to compare total energy reserves across companies on one scale. Roughly 6,000 cubic feet of natural gas equals 1 BOE. Without this conversion, comparing an oil-heavy company to a gas-heavy one would be apples-to-oranges.

Global oil consumption in 2024 was approximately 102 million barrels per day — or about 102 million BOE/day just from oil. Including natural gas and coal, total world primary energy consumption is roughly 580 million BOE/day equivalent. The US alone accounts for about 20 million barrels per day.

A physical barrel of crude oil is 42 US gallons (~159 liters) of liquid petroleum. A BOE is a standardized energy unit pegged to the average energy content of that barrel (6.118 GJ). Light crudes like Brent may actually yield slightly more energy per barrel, while heavy crudes yield less. The BOE smooths out these differences for accounting purposes.

A typical EV driven 20,000 km/year consumes about 3,500 kWh, which is roughly 2 BOE of energy. A petrol car covering the same distance burns about 1,500 liters of fuel — approximately 9.5 BOE. The EV uses roughly one-fifth the primary energy, largely because electric motors are 85–95% efficient while combustion engines waste 60–75% as heat.

One kilogram of TNT releases 4.184 MJ — enough to shatter windows within several meters and cause serious injury at close range. In open air, 1 kg of TNT produces a blast overpressure lethal to humans within about 2–3 meters. The effect depends heavily on confinement: the same charge inside a vehicle or building is far more destructive than in open ground.

One kilogram of TNT (4.184 MJ) is roughly the kinetic energy of a 1,500 kg car traveling at 75 km/h, or the energy stored in about 120 mL (half a cup) of petrol. It is also the chemical energy in roughly one large meal (1,000 kcal). The difference is that TNT releases its energy in microseconds rather than hours.

Mining engineers express blast charge sizes in kg of TNT equivalent to standardize across different commercial explosives. A typical quarry blast hole uses 5–50 kg of ANFO (ammonium nitrate/fuel oil), equivalent to roughly 4–37 kg TNT. Building demolition charges range from 10 to several hundred kg TNT equivalent, carefully placed at structural weak points.

A standard 155 mm artillery shell contains about 7–11 kg of TNT equivalent. A 500 lb (Mk 82) air-dropped bomb holds roughly 87 kg of TNT equivalent. An RPG-7 warhead is about 1–2 kg TNT equivalent. Anti-tank mines range from 5–10 kg TNT equivalent. These figures represent explosive fill, not total weapon weight.

A standard stick of commercial dynamite (about 200 g, 20 cm long) has a TNT equivalence of roughly 0.25–0.30 kg, since dynamite is about 1.25–1.5× as powerful as TNT by weight. Eight sticks of dynamite are roughly equivalent to one kilogram of TNT. Modern mining rarely uses traditional dynamite, preferring cheaper ANFO or emulsion explosives.