The daily progressive-miner., 1916-03-18
NEW DISCOVERY OF
 VAST IMPORTANCE
GASOLINE FROM STALE MAY PROVE A VERY STRONG
 COMPETITOR.

In view of the ever-increasing de mand for gasoline and the increase in price of crude oil, from which it is obtained, it is important to know that an almost inexhaustible supply of oil may be obtained from the shale of northwestern Colorados northeastern Utah, and southwest en Wyoming. This shale contains materials which, when heated, may be converted into crude oil, gas, and ammonia. The high cost of distilling oil from shale as com pared to the cost of producing oil from wells has thus far prevented the development in this country of such an industry and may continue to prevent it for some time, but sooner or later this great source of supply will be utilized to sup plement the decreasing production from the regular oil fields.
 The oil derived from the shale is similar to that which is being pro- duced from wells in the United States at the rate of more than 250,000,000 barrels a year. When refined by ordinary methods the shale oil yields an average of about 10 per cent gasoline, 95 per cent kerosene, and a large amount of paraffin. The yield of gasoline from the shale may probably be largely increased by the use of refining methods especially designed for that purpose. The gas, which is a very good Illuminating gas, will perhaps be sufficient to furnish all the heat required to distill the crude oil from the shale
 The ammonia is a most valuable by-product of the distillation and may be utilized in the manufacture of commercial fertilizer or other nitrogen compounds, as the market demands. The United States Geo. logical Survey has examined large areas of the shale in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming and has made many distillation tests. Some beds of shale that are several feet thick will yield more than a barrel of oil to the ton of shale, and one bed inches thick will yield more than two barrels of crude oil to the ton of shale. One ton of this shale should therefore yield nearly 10 gallons of gasoline by the pres ent commercial methods of gaso- line extraction, and larger yields may be made possible by new methods.
 Little attention has been paid to this shale because the quantity of petroleum produced from wells in the United States has been suffi- cient to satisfy all demands, but for more than 30 years the oil shale industry of Scotland has been a very important one. In recent year more than 5000 men were em- ployed in the industry in that country, get the average yield of oil per ton of shale was much less than that which appears possible from the shale of Colorado and Utah. It is estimated that in Col orado alone there is sufficient shale, in beds feet or more thick and richer than the shale being mined in Scotland, to yield twenty billion barrels of crude oil, from which at least two billion barrels of gaso- line may be extracted by ordinary refining processes.
 As was stated in the recent reply of Secretary Lane to Senate reso- lut:-.n on the subject of gasoline: "The development of this enormous reserve simply awaits the time when the price of gasoline or the demand for other distillation pro ducts warrants the utilization of this substitute source. This may happen in the future. At all events these shales are likely to be drawn upon long before the exhaustion of the petroleum fields"
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