between state and federal authority would melt away in the presence 

 of such an awful calamity, and the mighty arm of the nation would 

 be invoked to help end the common peril to every interest. And yet 

 this imaginary case is an actual one with the best and purest fuel of 

 the country, equal probably in quantity and value for heat, light, and 

 power to all of our coal resources. This blazing zone of destruction 

 extends in a broad band from the Lakes to the Gulf, and' westward to 

 the Pacific, embracing in its naming pathway the most precious fuel 

 possessions of a continent. No one can even approximate the extent 

 of this waste. From personal knowledge of conditions which exist in 

 every oil and gas field, I am sure the quantity will amount to not less 

 than one billion cubic feet daily, and it may be much more. The 

 heating value of a billion cubic feet of natural gas is roughly equiv- 

 alent to that of one million bushels of coal. What an appalling record 

 to transmit to posterity ! 



Forest fire at night a most awe-inspiring sight| Then, most of all. one is im- 

 prssed with the terribleness of the waste- and the relentless power of the fire. The 

 growth of perhaps a hundred years is destroyed in a few hours. 



From one well in eastern Kentucky there poured a stream of gas 

 for a period of twenty years without any attempt to shut it in or 

 utilize it, the output of which, it has been figured, was worth at current 

 prices more than three million dollars. Practically the same condi- 

 tions characterized the first twenty-five years of Pennsylvania's oil 

 and gas history, and the quantity of wasted gas from thousands t)f 

 oil and gas wells in western Pennsylvania is beyond computation. In 

 my own state of West Virginia, only eight years ago, not less than 

 500,000,000 cubic feet of this precious gas was daily escaping into the 

 air from two counties alone, practically all of which was easily pre- 

 ventable, by a moderate expenditure for additional casing. When it 

 is remembered that one thousand cubic feet of natural gas weighs 48 

 pounds, and that 6,000 cubic feet of it would yield a 42-gallon barrel 



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