50 
BULLETIN 102, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 
While these shales have only recently come into notice a similar 
resource has for many years been profitably exploited in Scotland, 
New South Wales, and France, where nature has been less bountiful 
with petroleum; while in Germany the extraction of oil from low- 
grade coal and other bituminous materials has become a well estab- 
lished undertaking . 1 11 The financial success and national importance 
of the Scottish shale-oil industry is particularly significant, as this 
activity offers an established technology and a basis of experience 
for application to the domestic oil-shale matter . 2 A comparison of 
the domestic prospects with the foreign practice, in the way of yields 
and values, may not be out of place. 
General comparison between oil shale of Scotland and of Colorado-TJtah. a 
Average yield from 1 ton oil shale. 
Scot- 
land. 
Colorado- 
Utah. 
Use. 
Oil 
gallons.. 
24 
50 
Substitute for petroleum. 
Ammonium sulphate 
34 
17-25 
Fertilizer; nitrogen products. 
Gas 
2,000 
3,000 
Fuel. 
Shale residue 
pounds.. 
1,600 
1,500 
Brickmaking; road making; 
Cost of production 
Value of products 
Profit, per ton of shale 
1910 
$2.00 
2.80 
.80 
1918 
$2. 50-$3. 50 (?) 
3. 25- 3. 75 (?) 
.75- . 25 (?) 
possibly for extraction of 
potash.' Undeveloped pos- 
sibilities. 
a Data generalized from various sources, including Bulletin 641-F, United States Geological Survey, 1917; 
Bacon and Hamor, The American Petroleum Industry, 1916; Hearings on oil shales before the House 
Committee on the Public Lands Feb. 26, 1918; personal communications from David T. Day and Rus- 
sell D. George. The figures for Colorado-Utah are provisional rather than final, but are believed to be 
conservative. 
It is apparent from this table and from the general situation in 
respect to petroleum that domestic oil shale may soon come into com- 
mercial importance as a producing source of oil . 3 Just when will 
depend upon the trend of the economic situation as affecting the pro- 
duction of petroleum. 
As a matter of fact, considerable commercial activity has already 
ccmmenced looking toward the exploitation of the richer shale areas, 
especially in the Grand River Valley region of Colorado and near by 
1 The shale oil of Scotland has been of great service to the English Navy in the 
present war by supplying many oil-bearing ships with fuel, to the relief of trans- 
atlantic shipments; while the German oil has proved invaluable to that country in sup- 
plementing an inadequate command of petroleum resources. 
A good description of the Scottish shale-oil industry, with many references to the 
11 mature, may be found in Bacon and Hamor, The American petroleum industry, 1916, 
pp. 807-844. 
"“These shale areas will be developed in time on as safe and sane a basis as our 
< U mines of to-day. When that time arrives, the remains of oil prospecting will have 
■ led and the whole complexion of oil producing will change. It will, literally, be oil 
mining with steam shovels in open pits and glory holes ; and, later, tunnels and adits. 
There will be no lack of oil products for several generations to come, but the true oil 
fields of to-day will probably disappear within another generation and be replaced by 
oil mines.” Dorsey Hager, The search for new oil fields in the United States : Engineer- 
ing and Mining Journal, Jan. 5, 1918, pp. 11-12. 
