Oil Production in New Zealand.

Cromwell Argus, Volume XLIII, Issue 2286, 26 February 1912, Page 6

Oil Production in New Zealand.

PROMISING PROSPECTS, Although the amount does not sound very impressive, the flow of crude oil at the rate of a gallon per minute from one of the bores at New Plymouth is distinctly encouraging, remarks a contemporary. There are 11,090 active welld in the United States, and their average output is only four barrels a day. The history of the oil industry in America is of very great interest. In 1805, it is said, a financier could have secured control of the entire" output of petro* leum by the investment of £IOO,OOO, while in 1010 the petroleum produced was valued at nearly £20,000,000. Probably no other industry has made so many millionaires and multimillionaires as the oil business has. At one time the industry was confined wholly to Pennsylvania, but it now extends as far we.it a>' California and as far south-west as Texa:.. Oil is produced in Louisiana, in Kansas and Okl&uoma, nnd it is known tbat tbete are underground streams and rivers oi it yet untouched. Some 8,500,000 acres of land are leased by the oil operators and 700,000 acres are owned by them. It was at one time thought that the wells would soon drain the subterranean stores, hut this has not been the case. The supply his not been easily exhausted. The first well was sunk in 1850, and if it were properly cleaned out it would still yield one-third of a barrel a day, Russia used to be the greatest oilproducing country, but to-day the United States produces more oil in-an the rest of the world, and its output has doubled itself four times in the last twenty years. The petroleum is given its great value more by its virtues as a fuel than as an illuminant, and the demand for it by shipping, railways and many other branches of industry is growing with extraordin-. ary rapidity. The search for new sources of supply is now practically world wide, and it is gratifying to know that in the opinion of experts the oilfields in both the North and the South Islands of New Zealand give promise of adding materially to the wealth of the Dominion.