The Search for Oil

Grey River Argus, 21 March 1940, Page 9

The Search for Oil

Why Not Get It From Coai?

The oil industry of the world actuI ally began in Britain. In the 1850’s | a Scottish chemist, James Young., found that he could obtain a thick i oily substance by heating slabs of I rock called shale. Young distilled some of this oil, and from it obtained paraffin wax, tar, and heavy oils. When, in 1859, crude oil was discovered in Pennsylvania, Young’s process was used in distilling. I As oil does not lie in convenient pools beneath the earth’s surface, geologists may have to search for years before finding a suitable place to drill. Instruments, called magnetometers, are sometimes used to measure and compare the earth’s magnetism over various points. The earth’s gravitational pull may also have to be measured.

The oil may be found in pockets at any depth up to three miles. As boring costs from three to seven pounds a foot, and most drillings go at least down to five thousand feet, it will be seen what a large sum must have already been spent, even in this country trying to locate oilfields.

In 1936 the Government were said to be embarking on a three-year plan for the erection of oil storage tanks in safety zones. At that time the difficulty of storing petrol was stressed. These facts have no doubt given the oil prospectors an impetus. Let us hope that these gentlemen will find some way of tapping the national resources with a little less brutality than is done abroad. The oil wastes in foreign oilfields fire a disgrace to civilisation. —“The Millgate”, Co-operative Magazine.