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Show I Views of an Expert on the Oil Fields of Utah. IP. JT. Donahuo Speaks of the Possibilities Possi-bilities of Salt Lake "Valley m an Oil-Producing Territory. ttt HILB talking with a Call- 11 fornla mlnlntr man. who has f taken iv flyer in oil In his own State, I told him I believed we would have Great oil fields developed hero within the next year. He sold he hod apoken to a mlnlnff man whom I knew well and that this party had told him It would ho lmpoRnble to And oil In this valley on account of the faults. I told him there never was oil found except along- a line of faults and after a moment's thought he paid he thought I was correct." oald P. J. Donohuc, tho expert miner and geologist, yesterday. I"Threo years ago I began the study or this valley with reference to Its gas and oll-bcarlng windo. I then mado the statement that this gas, showing in the valley, found its vent through tho Wa-Fatch Wa-Fatch fault and I believed it came from great depth. At that time T made a diagram fhowlng my idea of the gas phenomena, showing- the fault and ihere Ftrata of sand reaching close to Ihe fault would be impregnated with the gas, the gao following the place of leant resistance would go out along these sands and gravels and would be large or email, according to the amount of the nands and their distance or proximity prox-imity to the fault. I noted tho sandstones sand-stones above Fort Douglas reaching out and disappearing north of Beck's Hot Springs. Under theso tho llmc-f llmc-f tones which nhow in Parley's canyon and nlong north of tho "Warm Springs, t. here, through the action of the "Wasatch "Wa-satch fault they disappear under the alluvium of the valley. Brigbam City Wells. I found the same conditions existing at Brlgham City where the gas mounds are very large and pronounced, and here, today, gas can be heard rumbling under these mounds. "While the.ro a couple of months ago wo were examining examin-ing tho place where tho new gas well had been found. Mr. Knudsen, who wan fhowlng us the ground, was lamenting la-menting that there were no indications of gas. Suddenly there was a rumbling like a miniature earthquake, the ground woh shaken for thirty or forty feet in diameter. It Is needless to Kiy we all very quickly got off the mound. After the nolso subsided we noted a few cracks along the surface and Mr. Knud-en Knud-en stepped up to see if the gas was ere. striking a match close to the ,ok. I wan at the tlm-. within about feet of him. thinking I would bo per-y per-y tmfe, even If there should bo gas e crack. As soon aa the match 1 truck and beforo any of us had to move the whole mound was d with flame and for ten or flf-dnutes flf-dnutes it burned from two to Afreet Af-reet In the air. ground at Promontory, where the turn seepages are, also shows indication of faulting and my l 1 that this seepage comes from c body of asphaltum below, which ,jc-d up through small Assures until junters the wind and water where "ooled and partially hardened. ' Many Indications of Oil-, king Into consideration the showing ills nnd oil thnles found around Sol-r Sol-r Summit, nnd extending down Into ic valley on this side, the gar? found at 'astllla Springs, ah well us Us hot sul-jihur sul-jihur waters, the gas mounds and secp-ttgen secp-ttgen of gas all along this valley, espc-dally espc-dally at Wood's Cross, C'entervllle, Farming ton and Brlgham City, with Hj Feepa of asphaltum at Corlnnc nnd Hj ' Promontory, nnd oil in small quantities encountered In the artesian wells at Tludy'R ranch and the Burnham ranch, clow to the flock yards on the Jordan M rlvcx, and In the well at Silver's house, M on Fifth Haft street. Salt Lako City. Now for tho volcanic theory wo have the Wnsatch fault which would give-ready give-ready accent to the oils and gas. And for the organic theory' there is Lake Bonneville, whose old shore lines arc ho plainly marked nlong our mountain Fide, When thin lake wan drained, tvould not the Ash and other life Ailing its water naturully seek tho lat place to dry, in other wordn the lowest spot W in this valley. Taking all existing con-dltlnns con-dltlnns Into consideration, I have no hesitancy in saying Hint here will be developed one of tho great oil Acids of the uorld. It Took Thno in Texas. Many of the people here wero dl.?-couraged dl.?-couraged by the previous? attempt to j develop tho gas In this Held. I And that gat? and oil ore known to exist cloro to Beaumont. Tex., from the first settlc-mcnt settlc-mcnt of Texas, nnd spasmodic attempts nt development at Sour Lake had been made slnco 1S62, nnd no Well brought in M until 1002, so thnt there Is no need to feel j discouraged about this fluid as It Is only going through the same evolutions as other Aelds have gone through before the Arst well was brought in. For Instance, the Lucas well, which 1 brought Beuumont into prominence, -una one year and a half in course of construction, during which time they j met with a great many more dlaap-1 dlaap-1 polntmcnta than the Guffey-Galey pt-o-j pie hnvo encountered here. While re-ferring re-ferring to them, will say that they, the Guffey-Galey people, have brought in more new Aelds than probably any oth-tr oth-tr Arm In tho United Stntcsj. 1 In studying this question I And that j whatever the differences of opinion of thof? who believe in the organic or In-organic In-organic origin of oil they all agree In j -R hat Eugene Costp of Toronto, Can-ado. Can-ado. calls the sign manual of an oil Aeld. I believe that any person going over these Aelds will agree with me that they are oil and gas-bearing, after reading the following quotations from his paper (see pages 3 and A), read nt the Februnry meeting of thin year of tho American In.vtltuto of Mining Encl- Views of an Export. ' In all the oil and gas fields or petro-leum petro-leum deposits, the gaseous products are urder a strong pressure which Is not nrtealan or hydrostatic, which increases with depth, and which cannot be any-thing any-thing clso but a volcanic pressure, j "In some of thu oil nhd rbh Aelds, hented wators, oils and gases ar met "All the oil and gas Aelds bear. Im-j Im-j printed largely through tho products as-iioclaled as-iioclaled with tho oil and gas, tho seal referred to abovo ns tho distinct char-acterlstic char-acterlstic of solfatarlc cmuuatlons. Tho oil nnd rilb .Aelds arc located along the faulted and tissurd zones of the crust of the earth, iaratW to the great orogenic nnd volcanlo dislocations. "Oil, gas and bitumens are never Indigenous In-digenous to the strata in which they arc found they are secondary products Impregnating and cutting porous rocka of all ages, exactly as volcanic products alone could do. "Oil and gas are stored products, in great abundnnco in certain localities, while neighboring localities often are entirely barren; and many of tho strata among which they are found are so impervious im-pervious that tho source, of these hydrocarbons hydro-carbons must bo the volcanlo source below, be-low, which alone Is abundant enough, and alone possesses suAlclcnt energy, to force and accumulate suoh large quantities of theso and associated products pro-ducts In so many spots through such impervious strata. "Tho oil and gas ore always found under small mounds or salt Islands which are gentle recont quaquavcrsal uplifts or uplifted domes. This 1b fully conArmed by C. W. Hayes In a recent paper, and by others. "Tho salt water nnd the olh? under theso mounds arc still, in somo cases, hot. "Tho oil and gas under theso mounds I do not occur In any definite stratum, but In spots of many strata, and In ; very large quantities In these limited areas. "The same may be said of the products pro-ducts associated with the oil or gas under un-der these mounds, viz.: sulphur, hydrogen hydro-gen sulphide, wilt, gypsum, limestone and dolomites which form, under these mounds, many irregular masses and pockets without any stratlgraphlcal order or-der of any kind. "The above associated products arc not found In the wells drilled outside of tho mounds, nny more than the oil or gas, except In very small quantity, while under the mounds they often form vory thick vertical masses, hundreds and thousands of foot In thickness. "If theso well established facts aro kept carefully In mind no other conclusion con-clusion can be reached, but the ono adopted by Mr. mil. that theso materials mate-rials (of tho mounds associated with tho oil and Including the oil) have originated or-iginated by secondary replacement, and that they may be of Post-Tertiary age." Hill on Beaumont Fuel. Quoting from R. T. Hill's paper, A. M. M. E., Vol. 33, page 392. "Phenomena Accompanying tho Oil In tho Beaumont Field;" by studies and drill sections of the Const prairie the following facts have been developed: "First The oil Is closely associated with the mound3 occurring on their slopes or summits. "Second The mounds aro usually anticlinal an-ticlinal or quaquavcrsal In structure. "Third Most of the chemical phenomena phe-nomena of tho Lucas group occur In all these mounds Jn varying proportions. "Fourth In some localities hot water has been struck below the oil. "Fifth In the original Lucas group the oil itself was hot. "The oil seems to occur, not In any deAnlte continuous stratum, but in spots of many Btrata, under varying conditions. At nevernl places, notably at Rockland, Saratoga, and Sour Lake, It Is found at the surface as a malta or asphaltum. Impregnating spots In beds of sand which aro Indurated by It. "Gas In Immense quantities and frequently fre-quently under such pressure ns to wreck tho wells has been struck before reaching the oil." And from tho same paper page 202: "In the discussion of tho geology of the coast prairie I have given some evidence evi-dence of tho existence of a strong mononcllnal fold or faulting beneath the coast prairie." And again, from the same author, page 365: "Oil may occur in stratlAed rocks of any age from the oldest. Pale ozoic, as in Pennsylvania, to tho latest Tertiary, as in Texas." Cornlcan Aelds contain nt least two distinct oil horizons, the uppermost has an ahphnJtum base which is of a pari-Ane pari-Ane nature. And from tho same paper pages 5 and 0 and 10 we And: "The oils, waters and passes under these mounds are not under hydrostatic pretwure. This is amply am-ply demonstrated by the fact thnt the once famous gushers of Spindle-Top aro already gushing no more, and have now to be pumped. If tho pressure there wns artesian or hydrostatic they would be gushing yet, tho same as at Arst; and, If the oil had been exhausted In some of them, theso would be gushing gush-ing water out of the supposed artesian water-column behind tho oil. It Is now admitted that, in all the oil and gas Acids, the rock-pressure of the gas is a Btored energy continually decreasing as the gas escapes. Gas Itself has to be pumped today In many Aeldn where Its pressure was too strong at Arst. Surely, this phenomenon Is not a result of artesian arte-sian or hydrostatic pressure." I Guido to Important Results. The above views on the origin of tho I oll-phenomenn. not only of tho mounds and salt Islands of the Texas-Louisiana district, but of all other oil deposits, suggest a simple Interpretation of the geological occurrence of oil which should be a guide to Important results In the practical development of new oil and gaa Aelds In the United Stntes, as they havo already been such a valuable guide to me In the development of large new gas Aelds In Canada. Those views lead Indeed to the following important conclusion: Oil and gas were only supplied along some of the lines of structural weakness weak-ness or along some of tho fractured zones of the crust of the earth, and. therefore, the now Aelds are to be found only along those zones or belts. Tho numerous oil nnd gas Aelds, known today indicate plainly a considerable consid-erable number of these oil belts; but more remain to be discovered, and new ones are coming rapidly to the front, especially in the United States. That this Is tho solution oC the problem of the geological occurrence of oil and of oil developments and explorations the writer has long been convinced, on the considerations and for the reasons given above. It follows, therefore, that, ns far as practical results aro concerned, con-cerned, the Important point Is to accurately accu-rately trace these Assured zones or belts on good maps and to drill In the localities locali-ties thus Indicated. I will conclude by a quotation from Mr. Hill's paper regarding what ho had to say of conditions In Texas. Oil Needed for Fuel. "The only drawback to the prosperity of the State was the lack of an economic fuel, Inferior coal costing an average of 55 per ton at the time of the Beaumont discovery. This prevented the successful success-ful operation of any one of the thousands thou-sands of minor Industries upon which other communities ordlnarly depended for prosperity. As by a touch of magic this great fuel supply burst forth In a single day. thanks to Capt. Lucas, who, aided by tho wise laws of tho Railway commission, placed at the fireside of every citizen, nt every quarry, clay bank, sand pile, mine and mill the cheapest and best of fuels." With these factors In hand, who can even grasp the slgnlAcance of the great Industrial development which Is to take place within that empire during the next decade? Who can reckon :he prospective Increase In population: the municipal development; the operation of brick yards, factories, shops, mines and mills? If this Is true of Texas how much more true would It be of Utah when our own Held Is developed. |