BOYS' OWN COLUMN.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 237, 6 October 1928, Page 20 (Supplement)

BOYS' OWN COLUMN.

AUSTRALIAN LAKE OF * OIL.; ;.....-.,.■ A TALK ABOUT PETROLEUM.Dear Boys,— Recently it has been discovered that very deep down under Australia there is a huge oil lake, and arrangements are now being made to obtain the beat possible machine to lead that oil to the surface, where it can be broken up into its various products, and made to supply Australasia with motor spirit, fuel for driving ships, and medicines. . Oil has been known to man for centuries, and in parts of the Bible it is mentioned as "slime," whilst in yet another ancient writing it was'stated ■ that the oil was a means of curing camels of the mange, and, whilst being. I not good to eat, was quite suitable for burning-. So we see that over 1900 i" years ago oil was known as a fuel and a medicine. . It is said that oil is the result of vegetable and animal fats storing up within the earth after the decay of the giant animals and vegetation of the world during it» early period. ■ : , Oil to-day' is abundant in many places, America, perhaps, being the I best known of the oil-producing countries of the world. However, she j has not the monopoly and Persia, Russia, Mexico and other places must be credited with a certain amount of the oil consumed by the world. Britain, it is true, is a country very poor in oil, but nevertheless there is one factory . in Wales that deals with the refining of crude petroleum with the most up-to-date machinery obtainable. The crude oil is fed to the factory by huge tankers, which ship thousands of gallons across the sea from Persia to this , great British refinery. . Oil is very important in the world, and one could write much about its commercial side. However, we shall find a brief summary 1 of how the oil reaches us from the depths of the earth much mbre^interesting. An oilfield presents a most • unusual sight. A huge bristle-like ' structure towers up into the sky, and inside its many storeys machinery clangs and grinds. This to wet- is the oil man'* derrick, and is the means of drilling the hole through the many layers of rock which separate the oil' from the surface hundreds of feet above. When the giant drill has ground its way to the oil level sometimes there is a "gusher" caused by compressed petroleum gas above the lake. When this happens the oil is forced up the pipe and. squirted hundreds of feet into the air, sometimes taking the drill and derrick with it. ■ . .'- ■';• •'".-•., In some cases the oil thus liberated forms into a huge lake, but in modern oil wells the petroleum is forced through a series of pipe lines to the various places' where it is required; ' ' . .. Petroleum as a power is of the utmost importance, and it* value as ; medicine, extermination of the malaria-spreading mosquito, and a I hundred and cne other uses, are . ' . /ZF\ \: known to all. Let us- hope that jki/ _^^^"^**^ (F the opinion of some learned men, f\s t^^J&^£P**^ ■who predict that our natural . \^(]oAfi^i^^^ sources of petroleum can only last %jJ6r^j^r*^ I till about 1950, is at fault. . **r^ ...-' "