Petroleum deposits are known to exist over a great extent of territory in eastern Siberia, where development must wait for transportation facil ities to carry machinery, supplies, and shipments of oil. The existence of large quantities of petro leum has been proved in the northern part of the island of Saghalien, now held by Russia. Test wells there are said to have given promise of fully equaling some of the greatest of the Baku spout ers. Though no extensive development has yet been undertaken, this Saghalien field is admirably situated to dominate much of the Oriental trade. These untouched Russian deposits stand as vast re serve stores for future use, when the enormous resources of the Caspian shore shall have been ex hausted, or are no longer adequate to meet the increased demands. It is not at all unlikely that these localities in far-off trans-Caspia and Siberia will eventually become the mainstay of the world's petroleum industry.
Other Asiatic deposits are also known in addi tion to those in Russian territory and those already worked in India, Burma, and Japan. Explora tions in the desert, on the frontier between Persia and Turkey in Asia, have revealed the existence of valuable petroleum fields, and already a large English company has secured a sixty-year conces sion to carry on their exploitation. This same oil territory, moreover, apparently extends to the northwest across the border into Turkey, for fields of large extent have been discovered in the district near Bagdad. A concession for working these de posits has been secured by the company construct ing the Bagdad railroad. Not enough develop ment has yet been done to indicate the value of these deposits, but, even if they do not prove to be as rich as their neighbors at Baku, they will be of inestimable value in that country, now so destitute of satisfactory fuel. Any surplus above home consumption will find profitable markets close at hand, for the great population of India probably must always look to the outside world to secure much of its supply.
The work of development has already been begun in Beluchistan, the Punjab, and Assam, the last-named place said to have promise of a very good future. The Philippines, Formosa, and New Zealand show unmistakable surface signs of petro leum deposits, though all developments so far un dertaken have been failures. Lack of capital, how ever, has had much to do with this poor success. Whatever other oil-bearing localities may be found in the vast stretches of Asiatic territory, there is little doubt that the whole world might now easily draw its entire supply from the rich fields already known to exist there. It seems inevitable that all the great markets of the Orient must before long be lost to the western world through the develop ment of Asiatic resources.
The United States has no such reserve supplies of petroleum as are found in the territory of its rival—Russia. Some of the less accessible districts
of the West, however, hold out good prospects, especially in the case of the various fields in Wyo ming. The limit of production in the great Kan- • sas field is probably not yet reached. Alaska ap pears to contain several oil-bearing districts which may become second Klondikes. New developments may come at any time in Texas or in some of the little-known deposits of Montana and New Mexico. Unless the unexpected happens, however, it is more than likely that this country has already risen nearly to the height of its career. A continuation of the recent decline in Texas and the constantly heavier drains on the older fields, hastening an already rapidly approaching end, will mean the necessity of new developments far beyond any thing in sight now, to carry the production for any length of time much above its present high level.
Various other countries of the American conti nents are likely to appear in the list of important oil fields of the future. What is regarded as per haps one of the greatest fields in the world lies in the west and northwest of Canada. Twenty years ago a royal commission recommended set ting aside as a great petroleum reserve some 40,000 square miles in the vicinity about the Atha basca River and in the present province of Al berta. Recent settlement in this region has been accompanied by successful oil operations, the ex cessive freight rates from the Eastern markets having created highly favorable conditions for undertaking ventures of a very modest nature. Improved transportation facilities will make these deposits an important factor in the future indus try, if the present investigation in the interests of the British navy gives encouraging results.
Mexico was long regarded as a country devoid of extensive petroleum deposits; in fact, large cash inducements were offered by the government to anyone who would discover an important field. Recently, however, the country has sprung into prominence through the greatest and most spec tacular oil fire ever known, burning for two months, with successive explosions, converting the well into a veritable volcano, and flames reported to be shooting more than a thousand feet into the air. Defying all efforts to check its fury, it is esti mated that not less than 5,000,000 barrels of oil were burned in the first six weeks of its strange career. Such a quantity easily rivals the produc tion of the greatest wells of the Caucasus. It must be regarded as indicating the presence of very rich deposits in the Tampico district where the well was located. Numerous other Mexican localities have given satisfactory results in recent test wells, but none of them have approached this prodigious outpouring in the burning well of San Geronimo.