INCREASED RANGE OF MANUFACTURE AND USE OF PETROLEUM PRODUCTS Almost the entire American economy depends upon the rapid, uninterrupted, and economical transportation of people and of goods, and, to different degree, the same applies to all advanced countries. But most of the tremendous social and economic changes that have taken place in the United States can be said to be a direct result of the growth and progress of transportation. Development of automotive transportation in the United States, for instance, is one of the greatest economic phenomena of all his tory. It has put travel upon such an economical, personalized basis as to make self-transportation both practical and universal. At the same time it has contributed to the progress of other forms of transportation which have made progress.
Passenger motor vehicles, privately-owned, in the United States travel about 500,000,000,00o passenger-miles per year. Motor trucks provide annually more than 6o,000,000,000 ton-miles of commercial transportation. Motor buses carry some 4,000,000, 000 passengers more than 2,000,000,000 miles a year. Aside from making possible the development of automotive transportation, petroleum supplies the fuels and lubricants necessary to the func tioning of every other form and medium of transportation.
Petroleum lubricating oils and greases are indispensable to in dustry, necessary to the continuing operation of every machine, essential to every wheel that turns. Between 1879 and 1929 the value of the output of the factories of the United States increased 14 times to $70,000,000,000 from $5,000,000,000. In the same period consumption of petroleum lubricants expanded 4o times to 23,609,00obbl. from a mere 552,000 barrels. It is inconceivable that this tremendous advance in industry could have been possible without petroleum lubricants. No satisfactory substitute for petroleum as a lubricant is available. Literally there are hun dreds of different petroleum lubricants developed for special purposes and to meet unique industrial demands. A whole new
science of industrial lubrication has been developed.
Lubricants formerly used, such as those obtained from whale oil, never could have served growing industrial demand. Whale oil, limited and difficult of production and with output depend ing largely upon the whim of nature, costs around $35 a barrel as compared with approximately $1 for crude oil. Petroleum lubrication, being economical, satisfactory, and constantly avail able, has made possible the modern machine technology, mass production, continuous operation, widespread transportation, and even the generation of electric power.
Industry has come to depend upon petroleum also for heat and power. In many industries, such as glass, cement, and baking, fuel oil is virtually indispensable to instant and effective control of temperature. In the United States, homes also rapidly have changed from coal to oil heat. There has been an almost univer sal adaptation of the world's vessels to oil consumption. Nearly every ship built in recent years, and building, has been designed to utilize oil fuel. Mechanization of the world's armies also has placed highest importance upon oil for fueling and lubrication. Until comparatively recently there was a great demand for kero sene, man's first satisfactory illuminant. Kerosene still is an essential of farm life for light, for heat, for refrigeration and, to a degree, as fuel for farm machinery.
These are the more obvious manifestations of petroleum em ployed as a source of light, of heat, of power, of machine lubrica tion. Added to them are petroleum as a medicine and petroleum as a road material—asphalt. But out of petroleum come products whose number is so great and range of utilization so wide, as to defy listing. From petroleum come alcohols for the hospital and the home, solvents in the making of lacquers, soaps, and essential oils, products that on the one hand kill the parasites on the trees and on the other help to preserve the fruits and vegetables that are shipped in jars and containers.