Show INTEREST IN OIL growing interest is being manifested in the growing oil shale industry in this western country and especially so since the recent passage of the land leasing bill wonderful deposits of oil shale and oil sands have been found to exist in the western states notably utah colorado montana nevada arizona and california and the growing and insistent demand for crude oil with an apparent decline in production has turned much attention to the possibilities of oil production from our mammoth occurrences of and sands for the past few years considerable work experimental in its nature has been performed in retorting or extracting oil from shale and marked advances have been recorded in the methods employed and results obtained but there are as yet no large plants constructed for operations upon an extensive scale and until operations upon a commercial basis are inaugurated it will be difficult to make a satisfactory comparison or estimate upon the possibilities of the industry it is stated however that a number of retorting 1 plants are now in contemplation or even in course of construction A great many factors must be taken into consideration when plans are being perfected for the operation of plants for the treatment of oil one of the most important is the distance between reduction plant and source of supply another is the question of water supply and still another is the transportation problem the ultimate cost of the production of a barrel or gallon of crude oil has not yet been adequately determined experiments are being exhaustively made in several sections of the country tending to perfect processes for the extraction of oil from and oil sands and it is confidently expected before the close of the year that a simple and practical method methodi will be demonstrated which will give some sound basis upon which to judge of the value and possibilities of this coming great industry |