58 
BULLETIN 102, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 
hence dominate the situation. With increasing scope of organization 
in production, of course, these conditions tend to modify. With 
broadly integrated operations, production may escape entirely the 
influence of the factors noted. But, by and large, the situation in 
the United States is this : it costs a good deal to reach oil , 1 but little 
or nothing to produce it. When reached, the oil must be produced as 
rapidly as possible, else some one else will get it. There is an unlimited 
Fig. II. — Diagram showing the relation of oil wells to property lines in a 
TYPICAL PORTION OF THE MOST PRODUCTIVE LIGHT-OIL FIELD IN THE WORLD. NOTE THE 
SMALL HOLDINGS, EXCESSIVE NUMBER OF WELLS, AND THE TENDENCY OF WELLS TO 
OCCUR IN PAIRS ON THE OPPOSITE SIDES OF PROPERTY LINES. THIS DIAGRAM EPITOMIZES 
THE FUNDAMENTAL CAUSE OF PETROLEUM WASTE IN THE UNITED STATES. DATA FROM 
map by Carl H. Beal, Geologic Structure in the Cushing Oil and Gas Field, 
Oklahoma, Bulletin 658, U. S. Geological Survey, 1917, plate 4. 
demand for the crude product, with profit in such sale. In brief, the 
free operation of the law of supply and demand under continuation 
of small-unit competition in oil production is forcing the sacrifice 
of the greater part of our most essential and most limited resource. 
If so much be granted — and whatever the difference of opinion as 
to cause, the limited size and wasteful exploitation of the resource 
1 Much of this cost, under present conditions, is borne by unsuccessful prospectors. 
