MINERAL OIL SUPPLIES.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10628, 6 May 1912, Page 4

MINERAL OIL SUPPLIES.

■Ho'vv long will .the world's supply .of minanal c.i'l last? This is a question that 'ha,s t« ibe answered, in the face of thi? great consumption there is ■likely to Ibe' in the near future. Hitherto, i/rn using i:>p our mineral resources tfor Iheatii'ng purposes we have been ■practically using fjhe energy .given out by itflie sun -thousands of years ago, <wtan it caused tlhe growth of the forests from 'wihidh ithe coal '.measures are farimed—.for 'heat hs-only a form of enorgy. At rflhe ipresentjover-increasing rate lof consumption' 'it cannot ibe expected ithat e'xisting rfjuel supplies, even' if mineral oils be included, will last till a very remote date in. the future, brut if we couJid-lonlv utilise the sun's ibeat year by year there need never (be any fear lof fuel; supplies (running short. And, it seems that we imay be iwitihiin' a distance of sucih d d'ovelopmenit, and (that we iraay be abile Ito grow our annual crop of f ueil •just in the same way as we tuise the le&rtllr and ®u« to prixkce our' ; ifooa. v •supply,; forMJhe vtfari®; ExhSbitiion of/ 1900 a Diesel engine was forking quietly and leffecftively on vegetable dil ofotaJmed from the ' 'araohide," otherwise ifcnown; as tlhe "eartb nut" or "pea mut," -wilucli .grows in .considerable quantities in ttiliie French possessions dn' Nontltenn, Africa. In Russia, too, these engines ihave been .ran withreiasanaibfte success on castor oil. For a (bulge! lE.mipire llrke lours-the importance of .sudh ifaots can 'hardliribe. overestimated. iOf coxirae, tlie (use of vegetable oils as a source of power is net |gdi.r:g to Ihave any .immediate and far-reacfiiing effects on. the ■vrorid'.s au.tomdbite or otlknr engineering industries, tet it imusifc not ibe fargdtten that onily . twenty yea.rs' ago the use of mineral toil asia source of power was aflmtost as negligible as that of vegetable oil to-day. 'The fact that it can be used de- mdt important iais a .mere actuality, .but its potentialities cannot be measured.