Mr Charles Marvin, one of the first to direct attention to the Russian
petroleum fields at Baku, in speaking lately of the transference of
petroleum in bulk, said that America was at present the principal
petroleum power. By the development of the petroleum fields at Baku,
Russia had recently sprung into the position of the second petroleum
power; and Mr Marvin thought that England should come to the front and
occupy the third position as soon as possible. By the annexation of
King Theebaw’s dominions, we had come into possession of the Burmese
petroleum fields, and he thought steps ought to be taken at once by
the Indian government to survey these fields and to throw them open
to British capital and enterprise. Within the last few years, since
the extension of the railway, considerable petroleum deposits had been
discovered in Beluchistan, but he regretted that the Indian government
had decided to make them a Crown monopoly. Still more recently,
petroleum in abundance had been discovered in Egypt. Since he wrote in
1882 of the Caspian petroleum fields, eighty steamers had been placed
on that inland sea to carry oil in tanks from Baku to the mouth of
the Volga; and on the Volga there were upwards of a hundred vessels
running. At present, nearly all the petroleum arriving in Europe from
America was brought in barrels; several tank steamers were, however,
being constructed on the Tyne for the purpose of carrying petroleum in
bulk.
Mr Phillips, in lecturing at the Royal Aquarium on this subject, said
that the total shipments of refined oil from America in 1885 amounted
to 6,985,637 barrels, of which the United Kingdom received 1,269,723;
London taking 666,964 barrels. If the total shipments were placed in
barrels end to end, like a string of beads, they would reach from
London to New York. It is estimated that the world’s consumption of
illuminating oil amounts to 1,800,000 gallons every day. At the present
price of oil as sold retail, and taking an ordinary circular-wick
burner of forty candle power, it costs about three-sixteenths of a
penny per hour, which was fifty per cent. cheaper than gas. In this
connection, it may be mentioned that the Balloon Society of Great
Britain is offering a prize for a cheap safety-lamp suitable for
universal use. The annual production of mineral oil shale has continued
to increase in Scotland, until in the present year it stands at the
unprecedented figure of about two million tons.