The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. SATURDAY, MARCH 8, 1913. NEW ZEALAND’S COAL MEASURES.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 57, 8 March 1913, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. SATURDAY, MARCH 8, 1913. NEW ZEALAND’S COAL MEASURES.

Pi ofessor Park, in giving evidence before the Trade Commissioners the other day, spoke of the importance of reserving coal areas for the use of the State. He further asserted that it was a popular fancy to suppose that coal is very abundant in New Zealand, and gave an estimate based upon personal examination of the whole of the dominion’s coalfields. Brown coal lie estimated at 520 million tons, pitch coal at 306 million tons, and bituminous coal at 251 million tone. Working on these figures, there is urgent need for action on the part of the Government, as the prospect offering would be far from agreeable. The importation of coal is already large, and New Zealand would, in thirty or forty years, have to depend upon Australia for her supplies. The Southland News, however, suggests that Professor Park has not gone carefully enough into the possibilities of our coalfields when he gives such an estimate, and states that the knowledge in the hands of the Mining Department in regard to the mineral is not entirely reliable, and that, in view of the importance of an adequate coal supply, a complete survey of the whole coal-hearing area should he made, and the industry placed in a satisfactory position. It seems that the professor has underestimated the supply of lirowu coal, and the Southland paper suggests that perhaps In 1 is not familiar with the Nightcaps district, and is unaware that there arc eighty square miles of coal country. Considering the possible output at a comparatively low Held, there will be over 1001) million tons of brown coal available in t!i' Nightcaps district alone. The

same doubt may be considered to exist in regard to the estimate of the West Coast supplies. Our contemporary is under the impression that it lias heard from some official source that there is a sufficient supply of coal in the various Westland lields to provide for a 50 years’ supply on a very liberal exporting baisis. It has to he remembered that there are great and practically untried coal deposits in Taranaki and further north, and it certainly appears true, as the Southland News says, that knowledge regarding our coal resources is very indefinite. A thorough investigation is hardly possible at this stage, and any estimates supplied must be largely guesswork.