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Show tai, arson Eieffoet ougos etorios to r" I L kw. y& m m-'fmt aii fit i v'.'hf1 m if (r ' Each year we try to go through the files and assess the most important stories reported in the past year. 1975 wasayearofalmosts, and several stories were of almost successes or almost al-most the one big story but final analysis gave the nod for honors to the geo-thermal geo-thermal development by Phillips Petroleum. Arson captured the number num-ber two spot, with high school athletics third. Withdrawal by the County and School Board from the SW District Health rated a fourth. The Alunite environmental impact im-pact statement was fifth. The County Fair in Min-ersville Min-ersville captured sixth place honors and adoption of the building codes and zoning, subdivision and mobile home ordinances were seventh. BLM reorganization was eighth, the Milford Drug report re-port ninth and the municipal and bond elections, tenth. About five successful wells have been completed, with pressures running about 250,000 pounds per hour and temperatures ranging over 500 degrees. Only one well has been extensively tested, as drilling drill-ing continues to prove the size of the steam reservoir. Phillips Petroleum is the only developer at present to do any extensive exploration and all of their exploration is in the Roosevelt Springs KGRA. In March bids of $2,676,123.38 were received receiv-ed on the Cove Fort KGRA and Union Oil Co., the successful suc-cessful bidder on the majority major-ity of units in the KGRA, is expected to begin exploration explora-tion of their holdings in the area this spring. In June, BLM held another lease sale on the Thermo KGRA, Lund KGRA, andMon-roe andMon-roe Hot Springs in Sevier County. Unsold units in Roosevelt Roo-sevelt Springs andCove Fort also were included. Only five units received bids and brought $29,495,35, mostly in the Thermo KGRA. The unsold units are re -advertised in this issue of the COUNTY NEWS. While geothermalexplora-tion geothermalexplora-tion has been an ongoing (Continued on Page 6) ANTELOPE TRANSPLANT: Division of Wildlife Resource Re-source employees trapped 147 antelope on ParkerMoun-tain ParkerMoun-tain on December 17 and transplanted half of them in John's Valley in Garfield County and took the other half to Puddle Valley northwest Grantsville. The picture shows the antelope being herded from the trap into a big semi trailer for transporting to their newhomes. Months of preparation went into the project with cooperation from the Division of Wildlife Resources, Forest Service and BLM. The herds are expected to attain huntable populations popula-tions in a few years. ford adopted zoning, subdivision subdi-vision and mobile home ordinances. or-dinances. BLM reorganized from eight to five districts, combining com-bining the Fillmore district with Richfield, excluding Beaver County, which became be-came a part of the Cedar City District. The reorganization reorgani-zation was opposed by nearly near-ly everyone, but was accomplished accomp-lished anyway. The Milford Drug Council report raised some eyebrows, eye-brows, but got no official sanction as city hall took the viewpoint of an ostrich. Elections in all the municipalities muni-cipalities drew reader Interest In-terest and water bond elections elec-tions in Milford andMlners-ville andMlners-ville were passed. All in all, It was a good year in Beaver County and the COUNTY NEWS covered the important events. Of the top ten stories, only arson and the drug report were on the negative side of the ledger led-ger and this should speak well for the county, which faces certain growth in the next few years from geo-thermal geo-thermal and alunite, and national na-tional attention of people who live where the ratio of stories run eight negative to two good. garages and residential outbuildings out-buildings were; the Barton , barn, the old Beaver County News building (now remodel-'ed remodel-'ed by Artnik), and the Kirk I Building on Main Street. The ' reign of terror finally ended on Sept. 20th with the Hazel , Moore property on 1st St. Two juveniles have been convicted and one sentenced to make restitution in the Barton barn fire. One adult is in the county jail. Athletics in Beaver County Coun-ty never had more recognition. recogni-tion. Milford captured the Region 8 championship and went on to second place in "the state tournament, with I Beaver taking third. Kanab, the only team to clip the Tigers wings last season, did it twice. Once for the state championship, bringing bring-ing the first three places back to Region 8. Beaver again brought home the state Class A football foot-ball crown, their fourth in seven years. - The school board withdrew from the FCAG Health Dis-"trict Dis-"trict and the county finally made the move in July, though by that time the name had changed to the SW District Dis-trict Health Dept. The withdrawal with-drawal became effective on Dec. 31, 1975. We're finally free. Much pressure has been exerted to withdraw from the FCAG (Five County AOG) before and since Iron County withdrew, but the Commissioners have remained re-mained firmly entrenched in the bureaucratic level of government. gov-ernment. Announcement that BLM was beginning to write the Alunite environmental impact im-pact statement about Thanksgiving Thanks-giving was welcome news, after the delay caused by BLM reorganization. Earth Sciences released their socio-economic study and their environmental impact assessment earlier in the year. The Commissioners and Mayors formed an 'alunite 'alu-nite council', which just recently re-cently turned over authority to the FCAG to assess the alunite project. The joint venture, called Alumet, is owned by Nat'l. Steel 40, Nat'l.. Southwire 40, and Earth Sciences 20. The Beaver County Commission has agreed to bond for $100 million industrial bonds on the project. The first Beaver County Fair was held in August in Minersville and probably involved in-volved more people than any other single project. Milford and Beaver adopted adopt-ed building codes and Mil- us, the parent company of Thermal Power Co. of Utah, which has its offices in Milford, Mil-ford, and possible exploration explora-tion by Chevron in the Thermo Ther-mo KGRA. Arsonists kept the local department jumping through the first half of the year, burning nearly amillion dollars dol-lars of private property before be-fore local police, with the help of state investigator Steve Kennedy and the FBI, cracked the case and brought three youths to trial. Several Sever-al others are implicated and investigations continue. The biggest single fire was at Essex, Int. copper mill, which closed in January. Arsonists Ar-sonists burned three big thickener tanks and damaged a fourth, each estimated to cost approximately $150,000. The Milford Fire Dept. was plagued with fires, starting start-ing in February with the burning burn-ing of the old Union Pacific Ice House, a historic landmark. land-mark. There were also many shacks burned, but several attempts were made on the old high school gym before the locker room was burned out in SeDtember. Other important im-portant buildings other than HERE'S MORE ABOUT Steam, arson thing throughout the year, . the major highlights came when the first well blew out with the Loffland drill rig over the hole, in April. This was the first indication to casual observers that the area was a producer. Phillips moved just north of that well and drilled the first production well, which has' been tested in several blows. Testing is limited due to reservoir restrictions and therefore figures are not conclusive, though Phillips is assured of commercial quantities of heat and pressure, pres-sure, if they have a commercial commer-cial reservoir. At present, they have nearly near-ly completed their drilling permits and are awaitingap-proval awaitingap-proval of additional permits by the U.S. Geological Survey. Sur-vey. If they are not approved shortly, the Loffland rig will be forced to shut down. On the horizon for geo-thermal, geo-thermal, besides continued exploration by Phillips and the start of exploration by Union Oil Co., are two wells on a state section byNatom- '1 |
