Evening star., 1926-05-09
FEDERAL BOARD SOON TO REPORT
ON CONSERVATION OF OIL SUPPLY
Advisors to Four Cabinet Members, Detailed by Cool.
idge to Study Industry, to Base Action
Decreasing Production.

, itself, VIII recommend less use Of oil.
particularly for uses that may be
classed as non essential and elevation
or coal in place Of oil in many indus
tries and homes where oil now is used.
That coal, long king in the fuel
and heating world. should again be
elevated to its place as a competitor
Tor oil, is the opinion of men CON
nected with the board Rising coal
prices and the cleanliness and con-
venience of oil as fuel have all con-
tributed to larger use of the cheap
grade of oil used In domestic heat
ing plants. But oil has spread it's
field until today it is being used in
many industries where coal was
formerly used. Coal strikes and their
attendant fuel shortages have all con-
tributed to the growing use of oil, for
strikes in the petroleum fields are rare
and even when work stops, the strike
is usually confined to but a small por-
ton of producing territory and the
bulk of production is affected but
little.
The report of the board unquestion-
ably will have its effect on oil stocks
and on the Nation as a whole. view
ing its potential oil production and
future production possibilities in
different light in the larger insight
into the situation to be revealed in
the report.
What the effect of the report will
be, only the board members and those
of the advisory committee alone can
estimate. For the board reporN Is
not yet completed, and is. of course.
highly confidential.
While the public interest will be
we'll taken care of, particularly with
regard to future petroleum policy on
Government, oil lands. which produce
estimated 700 100000 annual produc-
tion, the United States Government
views the needs of the Navy for petro-
1eum as one of the most Vital factors
of national defense. The board will
devote much of it's report to Navy oil
needs. Uncle Sans battleShips today
are largely oil burners, which is to
say the initial heat is produced by
fuel OIL The old .coal passer of an
other Navy day-grimy, sooty and COW
cred with coal dust--has passed into
another era. and today the Navy takes
its fuel through pipe lines instead of
bags. And it uses quite a bit of oil,
too. The Navy's petroleum needs
must be protected.
Industry Aids Inquiry.
In all the immense work of obtain
ing and tabulating the data which will
go into the final result Of the most ex-
haustive inquiry ever undertaken into
oil, the industry itself has been of i'm
measurable help to the oil board.
Leaders in the petroleum producing
and selling business have opened up
their business to the Government,
working on the theory that the Gov
NHrv rSn& vr-fll do &c
not hinder. This spirit, according to
board officials, has greatly aided the
inquiry by obtaining much material
that might otherwise not be readily
obtained and might conceivably be in
accessible in some cases.
This cooperation has been purely
voluntary and not q matter of gov
ernmental pressure, for the industry
itself realizes that oil is not g. definite
ly measurable substance in point of
production, and that unless sensibly
conserved the day may come when
production will drop off so appreci-
ably that many of the now existing
companies will have to drop out
forced out Of the field by lack of pro
ducing wells. This day is not vet
around the corner, but the board has
been told present recovery. methods
are WdSte1 III III lHS EXTREME ana tnat
unless new fields are developed by
pooling and consideration of the field
as such and not as so many individual
wells, an end to the present flush pro-
duction may come within decade.
Biologists estimate that present re-
covery methods bring to the surface
not more than 80 per cent of the re-
coverable oil, and hope, by preventing
escape of the gas, which always ac-
companies oil, to bring petroleum re-
covery UP to at least 60 per cent, and
perhaps to % per cent of the possible
flow.