Rensselaer Republican, Volume 21, Number 53, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 September 1889 — IS OIL PLAYING OUT? [ARTICLE]

IS OIL PLAYING OUT?

Prof. Carll of the Pennsylvania Geological Survey Takes a Gloomy View. New York special to the St Louis Globe-Democrat : John F. Carll is Assistant Geologist of the state of Pennsylvania, and for several years it has been his especial business to collect Statistics and all available information regarding petroleum and natural gas. Prof. Carll lives at Pleasantville, Venango county. Fa., in the heart of the great petroleum fields, and has had opportunities of making a careful study of the oil industry. His geological reports made for the state are invaluable to the trade and are eagerly sought after, both by producers and speculators. In conversation with Prof. Carll he expressed to the writer some rather sensational opinions regarding the future supply of petroleum. Notwithstanding other views are taken by producers, Prof. Carll says the petroleum fields of Pennsylvania are being rapidly drained, and at the present rate of exhaustion it will not be many years until the question of supplying the world with petroleum will be a most serious one. “For the past year,” said Prof. Carll, “the supply was 5,000,000 barrels short of the demand, as gauged by former years, and every day the demand is more and the supply much less. A few years ago the reverse was the case. Stocks were piling up at the rate of 2,000,000 barrels per month, oi about that, and now they are being decreased at the rate of 1,000,000 barrels a month, and have' been for the past i year. This shortage in the supply includes the large production of the Ohio fields, where extraordinary results have been obtained in the way of large wells.” There are now something like 12,000,000 barrels of petroleum in tanks in the Ohio, field, but this was because Ohio oil was not yet used extensively as an illummant Prof. Carll was asked his opinion regarding the probable extent of the Ohio field, and said he believed it would be found much less in extent than the trade and the public generally believed. There have been opinions expressed that the yield of the Ohio field could be increased to 100,000 barrels a day. He thought it would not last long at this rate of production. “When this field comes to be entirely defined,” he said, “it is pretty sure to fall very much below the expectations that are now held out for it.” When asked if he thought Ohio oil would ever be successfully refined and enter the market as a competitor of the Pennsylvania product, he said: “1 certainly hope so. Without this oil 1 can not see where the world’s supply is too come from, and it would be a ▼ery great hardship to the people if they had to give up this cheap and popular illuminant. Neither gas nor electricity, in my judgement, can ever take its place as a means of illumination for the masses. And yet, with the known fields being as rapidly exhausted as they are, I look before many years for a great scarcity oi petroleum.” Bradford was the field that produced such an extraordinary quantity of oil, pilihg up the stocks in tanks until they reached 86,000,000 barrels, with the field still yielding 60,000 barrels a day or thereabouts. In regard to the possibility of another such field being discovered, Prof. Carill said he-believed there ” was absolutely" no likelihood of it. The number ol experimental wells that had been drilled in search of another Bradford sand in all parts of the country seemed to establish the fact that Bradford was unique and alone. He did not believe that such a petroleum deposit as this would ever be found in any country in the world. The Brad- & ford field and its annex in Allegany county, N. Y., are apparently being drained to the dregs. At one time the production of the field was as high as 105,000 barrels every twenty-four hours. Now it is dowu below 20,000, possibly as low as 18,000 barrels. Bradford has produced about 56,000,000 barrels of oil, and a pool that will yield the fifty-sixth part of this is something that the oil producer is eagerly looking for. Prof. Carll said there were yet possibilities of opening up •mall pools that would produce from 1,000.000 to 8,000,000 barrels, even in some of the old fields, such as Venango, Warren and Bui ter counties, in Pennsylvania, but even these possibilities were growing more and more remote. The Cogley field, which has produced about 8,000,000 barrels, was the last extensive field found in Venango county, and this was perhaps as large a field as would ever be found there again. Considerable exploring has been done in Kentucky for petroleum, and 2fcof- Carll was asked his opinion in ! regard to the likelihood of oil being ' found in that state in paying quantities. He thought from his observar tions in that state that Kentucky would yet produce consider ble oil, but nothing in comparison with Penney 1 vania. The oil-bearing sands underlie a portion of Kentucky and lap over into Tennessee, and here petroleum would be found, but in limited quantities. As to Texas, he was of the opinion that experiments there would never be profitable. Prof. Carll. before he beoame connected with the Geological Survey, went into Texas, in Nacpgdoches county, to su- . taJS I *%££. I

. ists who had great faith in the coun* 1 fey, because of alluring surface indications of oil. After drilling a well i or two and noting the various strata 1 of rock, he was convinced that petroleum in paying quantities would not be found there. The company decided, however, to prosecute the work, and only abandoned ii after spending 150,000 without any return. This was very soon after the early discoveries in Pennsylvania, and since that time other capitalists have continued experiments from time to time with not very gratifying ,refeults. Two companies, composed largely of New Orleans business men, are now drilling wells In Nacogdoches county, but so far there has been no money made at it. One company opened up a iyeU that produced 100 barrels a day of a lubricating oil. Two or three other good wells were soon struck in the same vicinity, and this encouraged the company to expend a large amount of money in building a pipe line to gel their oil to a railroad, some seventeen miles; but the wells soon ceased to yield, and the expensive pipe line has never had a barrel of oil pumped through it The three or four wells had exhausted the pool, and twenty-five or thirty wells drilled since have apt opened up another rich spot, and probably fifty wells will not The opinion expressed by Prof. Carll that the great oil fields can not much longer be relied upon Jo supply the world with a cheap illuminant is likely to set commercial people thinking.