Further Oil Development 



Further interest and significance in the search 

 for oil in Alberta, which is in active prosecution 

 from the international boundary to within the 

 Arctic circle, a distance of over a thousand 

 miles, is attached to the proposed large oil refinery 

 in the city of Calgary. The new establishment is 

 fraught with considerable importance not only 

 to the Alberta city, but to the entire West and 

 to the oil situation in Canada as a whole. It is 

 further evidence, if any were needed, of the 

 Imperial Oil Company's persistent faith in the 

 existence of commercial oil in Alberta and its 

 determination to prosecute its operations until 

 a successful conclusion is reached. 



The new refinery is to cost approximately 

 $2,500,000, and will be the largest project to 

 locate in Calgary since the Ogden Shops of the 

 Canadian Pacific Railway. A commencement 

 will be made either this fall or next spring. The 

 construction work upon the plant alone will 

 employ from 300 to 500 men from six to eight 

 months. The completed refinery will employ 

 from 200 to 250 skilled men. The payroll of the 

 city of Calgary will receive an addition to the 

 extent of about $50,000 a month, and taxes will 

 jump on the property several fold. The output 

 of the plant is expected to be from 2,500 to 

 3,500 barrels of gasoline per day, resulting in the 

 centralization of the gasoline distribution business 

 of the Province of Alberta in the southern city. 



Drilling at Ten Different Points 



The new plant, it is announced, will at first 

 secure its crude oil from the United States, that 

 is, from the well recently brought in in the Sweet- 

 grass country across the Montana border. There 

 is every reason to suppose, however, that a 

 development of such proportion is made with an 

 eye to the future and the confident expectation 

 of success attending the drilling activities at one 

 or more of wells which are being drilled at the 

 present time in many parts of the province by 

 the Imperial Oil Company. 



The Imperial Oil Company is at present prose- 

 cutingdrilling operations at ten different points in 

 Alberta, ranging from a few miles north of the 

 international boundary to the Fort Norman 

 district within the Arctic circle. The following 

 is the depth of drilling at the various wells on 

 August 18th: Boundary 3860 feet; Monitor or 

 Misty Hill 2907 feet; Fabyan or Grattan 

 2188 feet; Willow Creek 2705 feet; Pouce Coupe 

 2380 feet; Coalspur 1110 feet; Turner Valley or 

 Black Diamond 2704 feet. There are three 

 wells in the Fort Norman district which at the 

 latest reports received had attained the following 

 depth: Mackenzie River South Shore 1704 feet; 

 Bear Island 485 feet; Blue Fish 495 feet. These 

 are in addition to the first well at Fort Norman 

 where oil was struck and which is at the present 

 time being produced at an average of from 60 

 to 70 barrels per day, and the original depth of 



which has been increased to 991 feet. 



The new oil refinery at Calgary comes in 

 addition to thirteen similar plants operating in 

 Canada, to which again must be added six pro- 

 posed further plants. Of those already in 

 operation two are in British Columbia, three in 

 Alberta, one in Saskatchewan, one in Manitoba, 

 four in Ontario and one each in Quebec and 

 Nova Scotia. Crude petroleum is being brought 

 into Canada from three or four foreign countries. 

 For British Columbia it is brought from Peru; 

 for the Prairie Provinces from Texas, Kentucky, 

 and Wyoming. The United States fields also 

 supply the Ontario and Quebec refineries, whilst 

 the latter province also gets part of its crude oil 

 from Mexico. The Nova Scotia refinery draws 

 from Mexico, this plant having been built to 

 supply the navy during the war. 



Peat Production in Ontario 



In view of the chaotic state of the coal mining industry 

 in the United States, Eastern Canada will undoubtedly 

 experience a dearth of coal fuel during the coming winter, 

 and the problem of alleviating the situation has turned 

 attention to the more general use of peat, of which there 

 are large bogs located in Ontario. The lack of known coal 

 resources in that province has made the problem one of 

 paramount importance, and even though the coal mines of 

 the United States get back into their normal stride in a short 

 time, it is unlikely that the coal needs of Ontario will be 

 fully supplied. Develcpment work on the Alfred bog, 

 Prescott county, was carried on in a more or less desultory 

 manner by interested parties prior to 1918, when it was 

 taken over by the provincial and Federal governments, 

 under the supervision of a Peat Committee, for experi- 

 mental purposes. 



A survey of the peat situation in Canada shows that 

 there are about 37,000 square miles of bogs in the Domi- 

 nion, and to date 105 have been surveyed with an ag- 

 gregate area of approximately 224,131 acres. These 

 contain 190,330,170 tons of fuel and 20,588,110 tons of 

 litter. Forty-six of these bogs, which have been surveyed, 

 are in the Province of Ontario, with a total area of 132,321 

 acres, containing in the neighborhood of 110,109,000 

 short tons of peat fuel and 518,000 tons of peat litter. 

 During the past year four bogs were surveyed in the 

 province, a total of 11,089 acres being investigated. 

 Three of the bogs are situated near the cities of Fort 

 William and Port Arthur, and the fourth near Verona. 

 All these areas were found to contain peat suitable for coal. 



Heat Value Compared with Coal 



The excessive moisture of peat in its natural form is one 

 of the greatest drawbacks of successful production. From 

 82 to 92 per cent of peat as it is found in nature is moisture, 

 and this must be reduced to 25 to 30 per cent before it can 

 be used as an efficient fuel. In that form it is known as 

 Standard fuel, and has a heating value compared with 

 anthracite of li tons to 1 ton respectively. The big 

 advantage of peat over coal is the complete absence of 

 ash, which in coal amounts to between 10 and 25 per cent. 

 At the present time peat is advocated for cooking pur- 

 poses, and in the furnaces during the fall and spring 

 months. 



Much money has been expended on experiments and 

 improvements at Alfred, and production now ranges 

 around eight tons an hour, although plans are under con- 

 sideration lor increasing this rate to ten tons, the only 

 handicap being a lack of power. Investigations and 

 experiments carried on there during the past year or so 

 are now complete, and operations on a commercial scale 



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