OIL FIELD DEVELOPMENT OPERATIONS.
H. E. COLLOM, State Oil and Gas Supervisor.

From February 10, 1923, to and including March 10, 1923, the following new wells were reported as ready to drill:

SPECIAL ARTICLES.

Detailed technical reports on special subjects, the result of research work or extended field investigations, will continue to be issued as separate bulletins by the Bureau, as has been the custom in the past.

Shorter and less elaborate technical papers and articles by members of the staff containing much information that will add to the permanent value of the Monthly Chapter are included in each number of 'Mining in California.'

It is anticipated that these special articles will cover a wide range of subjects both of historical and current interest; descriptions of new processes, or metallurgical and industrial plants, new mineral occurrences, and interesting geological formations, as well as articles intended. to supply practical and timely information on the problems of the prospector and miner, such as the text of new laws and official regulations and notices affecting the mineral industry.

NOTES ON PEAT AND ITS OCCURRENCE IN CALIFORNIA
By C. McK. LAIZURE.

In 1921, the last year for which figures are available, California led all other states in the Union in the production of peat. Up to the present time the peat produced here has not been utilized as a fuel, and the State Mining Bureau has never made a field investigation or survey of the state's peat resources, nor collected production statistics as it has in the case of petroleum, coal, and natural gas. The occurrence of peat in Orange and Humboldt counties was briefly noted, however, in the Tenth and Eleventh Reports of the State Mineralogist, 1890-1892.

Inquiries from various sources have come to the State Mining Bureau during the past few years regarding the possibilities of the peat industry, and for the purpose of supplying some facts regarding this little known product and the localities in which it is found, the following notes have been compiled.

No claim to originality is made, most of the data herein having previously appeared in various publications, particularly the Journal of the American Peat Society; Transactions of the Commonwealth Club of San Francisco, 1912, and the United States Geological Survey Bulletin No. 728, 1922.

Peat is defined as the organic residuum resulting from the arrested decomposition of leaves, twigs, roots, trunks of trees, shrubs, mosses, and other vegetation in areas continually covered or saturated with

water.

It may be identified as the dark-colored soil found in bogs and swamps, commonly called muck, but if the material will ignite and burn. freely when dry, it preferably should be termed peat.

Native peat contains about ten per cent of solid matter and ninety per cent of water. Its specific gravity ranges from 0.1 to 1.06 and it weighs from 7 to 65 pounds per cubic foot. The reduction of its high content of moisture is the paramount necessity for commercial utilization. Attempts have been made to remove the excess moisture by com

pression, but it resists the heaviest pressure and its water content can be economically reduced only by evaporation.

The texture of peat depends upon the kinds of plants from which it was formed and the physical conditions under which it accumulated. It has been classified by its physical characteristics as turfy peat, fibrous peat, earthy peat, and pitchy peat.

Peat ranges in color from light yellow through various shades of brown to jet black, the color representing in a measure the degree of decomposition.

Chemically peat consists of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen and relatively small quantities of nitrogen. Its composition is illustrated by the following analysis (ash and moisture omitted):

The quantity of 'fixed' or 'free' carbon generally ranges from 10 to 60 per cent, the remainder being combined with other elements. Volatile matter usually ranges from 25 to 70 per cent, and moisture from 15 to 30 per cent in air-dried peat. As the volume of oxygen is relatively high, good peat ignites readily and burns freely, leaving little unconsumed residue. Sulphur usually ranges from 0.2 to 0.6 per cent, and nitrogen from 1 to 4 per cent. The ash in native peat, which renders it more or less impure, constitutes from 3 to 30 per cent of its dry weight. The ash content of the best peats in the United States ranges from 6 to 12 per cent, though many of the largest deposits in the Great Lakes area contain 15 per cent of ash.

The value of peat in soil fertilization lies in its content of nitrogen and humus and in the beneficial mechanical effect it produces on certain lands. Black, well-decomposed peats are the most satisfactory ordinary fertilizers, for they are generally heavier and more compact and contain more nitrogen and less fibrous material than the brown peats.

More than 50,000,000 tons of peat fuel are consumed annually by European countries, but only small quantities of peat fuel have been produced in the United States. Operators say that air-dried machine peat can be produced in the United States for from $1.50 to $5.00 per ton and that it could perhaps in some localities successfully compete with other fuels for domestic and industrial purposes.

Many extravagent claims concerning the fuel value of peat have been made, but authorities have concluded that peat can be converted into fuel on a large scale in the United States only in the form of machine blocks, powder, and gas.

Machine peat which is allowed to dry slowly contracts into a dense mass covered by a gelatinous skin-like substance called hydrocellulose. After the moisture has been reduced to about 25 per cent this coating renders the machine peat impervious to water, even when immersed. It is clean to handle and burns freely, yielding an intense heat and producing no soot or other objectionable deposit. For open grates this fuel is nearly ideal, and it is said that it may be burned in the same stoves as wood or coal.

For certain commercial uses powdered peat has many advantages over machine peat. In this form it may be blown with compressed air into the furnace where by means of forced draft, ignition is almost instantaneous and instead of burning on the grate the peat forms a gas which gives a uniform fire throughout the combustion chamber. Good peat thus treated when burned in furnaces designed to give the most complete and efficient combustion, will generate nearly as much energy in the form of live steam as the same weight of powdered coal. According to reports in this country, powdered peat has great possibilities, not only for boiler firing but for metallurgical work and for use in cement and other kinds of kilns in which powdered coal has been successfully burned.

Peat can also be made into briquets with a suitable binder, and although there are some advantages in the matter of cleanliness and less bulk, these advantages are largely offset by the high cost of production.

Peat coke is manufactured in Europe, and it is said to be equal in quality to the best grades of wood charcoal.

Alcohol, acetic acid, ammonia, ammonium sulphate, paraffin wax, illuminating and lubricating oil, phenol and asphalt are some of the valuable by-products obtained in coking peat by the dry distillation process.

Probably the most economical way to utilize peat as fuel is in the gas producer. Tests with Florida peat, carried on by the United States Geological Survey relative to using the producer gas for generating power, or peat under boilers for generating electricity by steam, showed that 5.78 pounds of dry peat per electrical horsepower hour were required by the steam plant, compared to 2.39 pounds with the gas producer.

Tesla coal, when used in the producer plant, required 2.38 pounds of dry coal, showing that Florida peat and Tesla coal are equivalent in this respect. It may be remarked here that the climatic conditions under which peat is formed in California are somewhat similar to those in Florida.

In comparing the gas obtained from peat with that from coal as to the heat units per cubic foot, the following results were obtained:

These figures show that peat gas has a higher heating value per cubic foot than that from the better gas-making coals. It should make an excellent fuel for ceramic kilns, lime and cement kilns, metallurgical furnaces, forges, ore-roasting and similar furnaces.

A complete description of peat-fuel machinery and manufacturing processes will be found in United States Bureau of Mines Bulletin No. 16, 'Uses of Peat, 1911.