SHALE OIL PLANT

Press, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23360, 20 June 1941, Page 8

SHALE OIL PLANT

AUSTRALIAN'

PETROL ‘ PRODUCTION

Already more than 2,000,000 ; gallpnl of high-grade tetra-ethyl I 'motor spirit have been produced from shale ' deposits at Glen Davis, in the Gapertea Valley, New South Wales, where the National Oil Proprietary, Ltd., .ufider agreement with the Commonwealth and New South Wales Governments, has 'spent more than £1,000,000 on plant for the first 'large-scale "enterprise of its kind in Australia.

New South Wales, shale is recognised as the richest in the world, and when the company first entered the valley in 1938 some work had already been undertaken by pioneers in the - industry. Plans have been made for, tha production of 10,000,000 gallons of petrol a year, and as the best part of the seam produces 120 gallons to. the tonf huge quantities of shale will b9 required. For 10,000,000 gallons of petrol about 20,000.000, gallons of crude shale oil must be treated. On an average the seam 5 is about sft 6in thick, which includes 44in of the main, richest seam. ,

Shale is hard to mine in the sense that it wears out cutters and drills faster than coal, but it is being won in very large quantities and brought from the depths of the mine by electric locomotives drawing an average of 30 tons each trip. , , , V.* After it has been broken by a crusher, the shale is placed in retdrts which, with the use of low temperature,'retorting, send hot gaseous products.; to separating and condensing equipment By this stage the material has become the warm, thick green shale oil. which is the basis of the hew petrolvindustry. After further treatment; J tHe‘ou and certain gases go to the. refinery, the most modern -of its kind ini; th» world, and,- this stage completed; .the raw petrol passes through processes which end- with the addition of tetfg* ethyl lead and colouring matter. Two 1,000,000-gallon tanks fecetV* the petrol, : which is then pun®* 4 through the 32-mile pipe-line, the long-' ‘est of its kind in Australia, running** Newnes Junction. The pipe-line if ifirst section of a 102-mile line .whip will eventually run to Blacktown. -A, < The company employs 550 perspM and their future is considered .asSursh* as there is enough shale nearby-'W last for ait least 30 years, even if production is 'considerably, increased,.. ..;!’ is claimed , that the supply wiR putay* the present plant, and no one camw what perspectives of productioa wU be opened out when the tunnel r.n3* extended to Newnes, where in recfM years a company attempted unsucceif'fully to make shale .patfv. .