Show Researchers Find Promise In Shale Retorting Method i Laboratory demonstration of If ofa a key step in blast atomic oil mining a process which scientists say could unlock more oil in the US alone then the entire world has ever pro was reported Monday by a government bureau ch them them- m 1st Bureau of Mines c chemist 11 C r Carpenter said he and and co- co corkers S S and II 11 W Soh ens demonstrated the feasibility of underground re- re retorting to extract oil from shale shah after the oil bearing rock Is shattered by an underground atomic explosion LARAMIE RESEARCH The team worked at the bureau's bur eau's petroleum research cen cen- center I ter in Laramie Wyoming Car Car- Carpenter penter said in a speech ed for at Ii a meeting of the American Chemical Society He said a mixture of oil shale chunks ranging from boulder size to small grains such as asI asa asa I a nuclear blast might create and varying in oil were heated under conditions simul- simul those expected if the pro cess were carried out in an un- un underground I cavern formed b by an explosion Carpenter said as much as 80 per cent or of the oil was was recovered ered FORCE FED FIRE In the experiment the shale was pt on n fire at atthe the top n and d the combustion was forced downward by injecting all air As As the burning zone moved downward its heat converted the shale's organic material to oil which drained to the bottom where it was removed Carpenter said lie He said enough combust combust- ible material remains after the oil is released to keep th com bustion going The bureau saId the ent of more than two trillion barrels of oil more than the worlds world's present petroleum re serves and past production cons com biped is believed to lie in the Green RIvo lannA lion under parts of Colorado Utah and Wyoming |