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Show OIL ACTIVITY IN UINTAH BASIN IS UNPRECEDENTED 1 i j Said to Be One of the Big Coining Producing Districts in Country; Winter No Hindrance to Extensive Prospecting. U ' PRECEDEXTED activity in the location of oil aui'l nil sliale lands 1 in the Uiutab basiu is reported: hy J. V. Mns.ser. ho returned ' yfstPrdav from a month's visit to the bain in the intnre.sts of oil concerns whii'h arf prpparirij to bppin operations in the foction. Mr. Musst was ar-'-om- ; 1 panied on his iipfction trip by Gb'u j I H. Uuby of Deuvpr, a (irotnint'nt gei'il- 1 foist Eissoi.-iaroil with thp Empire Gas an-1 Kuel company of Bartlesville, Okla. " Xotwith.stanilinn; the fact that winter win-ter ha laid mco to the basin country," said Mr. Mussor, 4 'oil interests from various parts of the country are continuing con-tinuing their activities in tne section. Scarcely a day passes that some geologist geol-ogist or oil expert does not register at one of the basin towns preparatory to making a quiet investigation and study of the oil conditions. The reports so far ha'e been unanimous in favor of the I in tali country becoming one of the real big oil producing districts of the country. "Mr. Ruhy made a careful investigation investi-gation of the formations on the south near Castle peak and Parriet mines, where gilsonite is being mined, and from- there worked his way to the northern rim of the basin, following the asphalt outcrop which is' easily traced for miles. Before leaving for the east Mr. Ruby expressed the opinion opin-ion that the field was far too important to remain idle and announced the intention in-tention of returning early in the year in the interests of the company he represents. rep-resents. ' 7 In one day while going over the fields Mr. Musser says he met five men in different localities, and each from a different state, conducting oil investigations. Californians Interested. A well recently was brought in near Vernal by California and Hawaiian interests in-terests and since then numerous lo-catibus lo-catibus have' been filed on adjoining lauds by some of the big oil concerns of the country which are preparing to begin drilling operations in the spring. Mr. Musser and his associates have acquired some holdings in this vicinity. The field has as its north and northeast north-east boundary the big asphalt outcrop which is encountered within a few miles of Vernal. To the northwest the Cedar Butte Oil company, controlled by California capitalists, has acquired heavy holdings, including a mountain of saturated oil sands. On the south of the field are large gilsonite veins which have been worked for years. Geologists, of national reputation, Mr. Musser reports, have expressed the opinion that this field, which is known as the Sand - Ridge anticline, gives promise of becoming a big producer. The Cedar Butte Oil company has announced that preparations have been made for a test of the sands in Salt Lake. Dr. P. S. Coke, general manager of the company, and some of the members mem-bers of the board of directors, are expected ex-pected in Salt Lake within the next week to supervise the test. The san'l mountain is situated north of White-rocks White-rocks Indian agency and the formation is of such a character that the oil sands may be handled by steam shovel. 0 and gas have been found oozing from a spring near the property. "While in the basin Mr. Musser met a German scientist, O. Schmidt, who has been giving considerable attention to the commercial development of the various hydro-carbon deposits. Mr. Schmidt announced that he had discovered dis-covered ichthyol, an exceedingly rare medicinal product formerly obtained from Austria, in the wurtzerite, another an-other oil product recently discovered in eastern Utah. It is reported also that a very high grade paraffin oil, principally liquid petrolatum, a refined niedu'inal' oil having the consistency of light lubricating oil and formerly imported im-ported from Russia, cau be produced from the oil found in the Uintah fields. Paraffin Base. "One feature of the basin oils," said Mr. Musser, 4 is that they generally show high-grade paraffin base, and samples sam-ples 1 have brought in from this trip run as high in gravity as 43.5 Baume. A product "of this character has a much Greater market value than the heavy asphalt oils of California and Mixico and many of the southern fields. 1 have brought with me also several hundred hun-dred pounds of sample oil shales, oil sands and other interesting specimens form the basin. "The Emerald Oil company, composed largely of Vernal business men, has drilled fourteen wells in doing validating validat-ing work, and now is on the fifteenth. The oil obtained is all of a paraffin base and yields high iu gas. Adjoining the Emerald holdings near Eangely is the property formerly held by the Colorado-Pacific Oil company, but which, 1 am informed, has been purchased recently re-cently by A. C. McLaughlin of San Francisco.' On this property wells have been drilled to oil in more than 100 places, and the oil is of the same high quality. "Among others who have recently located lands in the basin is a group of iinen heavily interested in the vicinity ol Hsner This groiiD represents Penn-svlvania, Penn-svlvania, Wyoming, Utah and Montana tapitalists. Another group is known as thr Kuhn-Kiil interests of Pittsburg. TJie C. I. Pierce people of Chicago have acquired holdings aggregating 10.000 acres. Prominent operators associated with th? Mexico Petroleum company in the Tampico fields form another holding uroup. and it is believed that from six th a d'zpn companies w 1 1 ! be actively imaged in oil development in Uintah during the coming year. Easterners Active. ''Among other visitors I met on the trip were L. H. Gustaveson of Salt Lake and J. B. -Tones of Kansas City, consulting engineers for the Ute Oil ?omp;inv, controlled by St. Louis and M,;waiikte capitalists, and one of the most active concerns in the oasin. The enranv has located about '.-10.000 acres o: land in the southeastern part of the M-in, and has been doing validating drilling f"r the past three years. The I company has a mo.iorn dnlling cam) at Llouana. where two modern rigs are at wnvk and whre it. is planned to drill rveral deep wells with standard rigs hfv srmm.cr. ' M ,-. ti-jpta veon also consulting cainper f..ir the ' '. I. Pierce people, and reprpent? the T'tah-Kadlc-tt. Oil com-p;i;iv, com-p;i;iv, a mii'inn-ooHrir corporation headed head-ed Pv I. H. I'ervine of Twin Falls, and v. hi:-h John I'ingree nf Salt Lake is i--- pjv-sideiit. Mr. Gu-Uavei-on has dc- vised a field apparatus for extracting oil from shales, and has been conducting extensive- tests in this direction, i "Mr. .Tones is an oil producer and engineer of wide experience, and i? manager man-ager of the Western Plains Oil company ot Tulsa, Okla., and consulting engineer for a number of companies. He and Mr. Gustaveson took a large number of samples of oil shales and sands from j different locations in the basin for test i purposes. While at Vernal they ex-t ex-t pressed the opinion that the extraction of oil from shale and sands would be-I be-I come an industry of great importance in eastern Utah and western Colorado. I "For sixty years the extraction of oil I from shale has been one of the big in- dus tries of Scotland. Until recently, however, the oil supply of the United States has heen sutricient without resorting re-sorting to shale.- The war has changed conditions materially. The demand for lighter oils has become greater than the production, and the country has been breaking heavily into the 175,000,000 barrels which normally constitutes the icserve supply, " Government experts, chief among whom is Dr. David T. Day of the geological geo-logical survey, have been giving a gfreat deal of attention to the oil situation, and have conducted exhaustive tests in the distillation of oil from shales and sands. It is estimated by the federal investigators that there are approximately approxi-mately 3000 square miles, of highly impregnated im-pregnated oil shales and sauds in'east-ern in'east-ern Utah and western Colorado, and that these shales and sands contain more than 70,000,000,000 barrels of oil, a sufficient quantity at the present rate of, eonsumpt:on to care for our needs for nearly 2-30 years without drawing upon the wells at all. Great mountains of seemingly barren rock extend for miles around the rim of the basin, and this rock, when placed in fire, burns readily, and tests have demonstrated that it contains con-tains from 2o to SO, and even as high as HO gallons of oil to the ton. "Much of the oil supply in the past 1 has been produced by tne California, ' Mid Continent and Appalachian fields, i . and it is not generally realized that two- j j thirds of the world 's supply of oil conies j i from the United States. However, the; oil fields are gradually becoming bar-! I ren. In view of this it is gratifying to ; know that the Rocky mountain field, embracing Utah, Colorado, Montana and Wyoming, is gradually increasing its production, and leading geologists are of the. opinion that the Uintah basin i i field will prove the greatest oil field ' of the west. From a production of I,-, I,-, 000,000 barrels in 1912, the Rocky moun-i moun-i tain field has increased to some 7,000,-j 7,000,-j 000 barrels annually, and its swaddling I clothes still are being worn." |