Tonne of oil equivalent
The tonne of oil equivalent is a unit of energy defined as the amount of energy released by burning one tonne of crude oil. It is approximately 42 gigajoules or 11.630 megawatt-hours, although as different crude oils have different calorific values, the exact value is defined by convention; several slightly different definitions exist. The toe is sometimes used for large amounts of energy.
Multiples of the toe are used, in particular the megatoe and the gigatoe. A smaller unit of kilogram of oil equivalent is also sometimes used denoting 1/1000 toe.
Definitions
The International Energy Agency defines one tonne of oil equivalent to be equal to:- 1 toe = 11.63 megawatt-hours
- 1 toe = 41.868 gigajoules
- 1 toe = 10 gigacalories –
- 1 toe = 39,683,207.2 British thermal units
- 1 toe = 1.42857143 tonnes of coal equivalent
- 1 toe = 7.33 barrels of oil equivalent
- 1 toe = 10.7 gigacalories –
- 1 toe = 41.85 gigajoules
- 1 toe = 44.769 gigajoules –
- 1 toe = 39,683,205.411 British thermal units
Conversion factors
- 1 barrel of oil equivalent contains approximately 0.136 toe.
- 1 t diesel = 1.01 toe
- 1 m3 diesel = 0.98 toe
- 1 t petrol = 1.05 toe
- 1 m3 petrol = 0.86 toe
- 1 t biodiesel = 0.86 toe
- 1 m3 biodiesel = 0.78 toe
- 1 t bioethanol = 0.64 toe
- 1 m3 bioethanol = 0.51 toe
- 1 MWh = 0.086 toe
- At thermal power plants, 1 MWh is generated with 0.22 toe fuel or 0.39 MWh with 0.086 toe
Derived units
For multiples of the tonne of oil equivalent, it is more usual to speak of millions of tonnes of oil equivalent and kilotonnes of oil equivalent.| Multiple | Name | Symbol |
| 103 | kilotonne of oil equivalent | ktoe |
| 106 | megatonne of oil equivalent | Mtoe |