THE OIL INDUSTRY.

Taranaki Daily News, 2 July 1915, Page 7

THE OIL INDUSTRY.

The statement at tlie annual meeting of the Shell Transport Company, according to a cablegram from London, that, the company had abandoned hope of obtaining oil supplies from New Zealand, will not make pleasant reading for Taranaki people, and for those outside Taranaki who have put their spare cash into petixdemri shares. Expert after uxjpert has assured the Xew Plymouth folk that their oil springs have a rich future before! them, and upon their reports the holders of shares and the people of the province generally have built up large hopes, and have pictured themselves the oil kings of the southern world. Xew Plymouth has schemes for largely improved harbor accommodation—even now it is able to berth a good-sized ocean steamer —and it has cherished pleasant visions of the rosy future when its wells shall pour their wealth into colossal tanks for the scores of oil carriers, . navy and merchantmen, which shall steer from all parts of the southern seas for F.gmont's ic.y sugarloaf.

Writes the Lyttclfcou Times:— Mneli money lias lieen sunk in boring ■work, and, although the borers have certainly strr.ek oil, what has come so far has 'been, comparatively speaking, a mere trickle. It may be that the real oil lake -of the Taranaki underworld has not yet heen tapped, and tluit deeper "borings will bring enormous deposits welling to the surface: hilt it cannot be denied that the results so far are disappointing. However, the petroleum prospecting work is still in its infancy, and Taranaki may yet sea its hopes happily realised. There, are possibilities also in other parts, as. for example, in the Rotorua-Ta-upo country. .At one spot in particular, at Waiotapu. in a State reserve, there are petroleum springs, and so pronounced are the indications of oil there that one .stream is generally known Kerosene Creek. This place has never been tested by a scientific. explorer, and it may lie found worth the working. New Zealand need not yet follow the Shell Transport Company's example and abandon all hope of commercial success for the oil wells,