Q2

[griffin.811]

See Lines 12-15.

These lines say that the natural pressure driving the crude (or the pipes as they currently are) have only enough pressure to drive the crude to the platform, just above the well head.

[ohthatpatrick]

Nice!

== other answers ==
(A) "higher" is a fake comparison; we never compare natural pressure to centrifugal pump pressure.

(B) "constant" is extreme and there's no way to support that idea.

(C) contradicted by 15-16

(E) contradicted by 12-19. If the natural pressure could bring the oil to shore, then we wouldn't be reading this whole passage, which describes pumps that aim to boost the natural pressure in order to get oil all the way to shore.

[AbhishekM843]

Nice!
(E) contradicted by 12-19. If the natural pressure could bring the oil to shore, then we wouldn't be reading this whole passage, which describes pumps that aim to boost the natural pressure in order to get oil all the way to shore.

Regarding the falsity of answer choice E, line 16-19, states that crude isn't 'consistently' carried to the shore because of the crude changing from liquid to gas suddenly. Doesn't the 'consistently' imply that in the absence of these phase changes, the pressure could theoretically be sufficient to carry the crude to the shore?

When answering the question, I supposed that there could be a pocket of crude they were drilling, and it could be uniformly composed of liquid phase only, so as to not encounter the phase change problem, and then it could be carried to shore, theoretically.