National Reports:
EUBANKS, BICKNELL
National Reports Texas Oilmen Fear Uranium By Bicknell Eubanks DALLAS WHAT IS going to happen to the tax structure of the major oil-producing states when uranium becomes a major source of energy...
...Frank B. Conselman of Abilene, Texas, a consulting petroleum geologist...
...The petroleum industry has already had the challenge thrown down by one of its best known and most respected men, Dr...
...As a result of all this, many of the old-line oil companies are moving actively into the hunt for uranium ores...
...Norton agrees that "great new problems will have to be met," that certain economic changes will occur, and, above all, that the people of Texas should face the new era each in his own sphere of activity...
...It is not whether?it is when...
...Among them are a Dallas attorney, Frank Norton, a member of an American Bar Association committee set up to study the legal angles of nuclear developments...
...Such things as stripper and secondary-recovery production may be completely eliminated...
...H. L. Hunt of Dallas, whose reputed $2 billion makes him the "wealthiest man in the world," is also reported to be buying up uranium leases throughout the West...
...oil shales may remain indefinitely suspended as a source of fuel...
...On the other hand, according to Dr...
...When the value of natural gas and natural-gas liquids is added, the total current value of all petroleum production comes to more than $7 1/2 billion annually...
...Conselman reported...
...Norton suggests that to predict the future of nuclear energy at this early stage "would be indeed foolhardy...
...Exclusive of the gasoline tax, Texas gets about a fifth of its revenue from the production of crude oil and natural gas and related activities...
...In contrast, the value of all other minerals combined —coal, iron ore, gold, silver, etc.?amounts to less than $7 billion per year...
...He recently handed the West Central Texas Oil and Gas Association some straight talk on "uranium—oil's newest competitor...
...Crude oil and natural gas provide almost two-thirds of the energy requirements of the United States...
...But Mr...
...Conselman, mineable uranium is now believed to contain from 20 to 25 times the energy of all known world reserves of coal, gas and oil combined...
...Conselman, practically all the oil companies operating in the Rocky Mountains are participating in the hunt...
...Oil men have no doubt that the development of atomic fuels will lessen the value of future high-cost oil properties...
...In addition, the state university's vast endowment fund is enriched annually by millions of dollars from state-owned lands which are rich oil producers...
...For the taxpayer, the impending competition of uranium with petroleum has some rather startling and disturbing possibilities...
...There is an unmistakable competitive situation shaping up between conventional and nuclear fuels in the near future," Dr...
...National Reports Texas Oilmen Fear Uranium By Bicknell Eubanks DALLAS WHAT IS going to happen to the tax structure of the major oil-producing states when uranium becomes a major source of energy for the nation's industrial system...
...Of course, there are some who do not expect atomic energy to replace oil completely...
...And what will be the effect on the oil and natural-gas industry itself...
...These are no longer hypothetical questions being asked in after-dinner conversation in petroleum clubs, or in casual talk by Southwestern economists, oil men, politicians and editorialists...
...So are many important independents, such as Kerr-McGee of Oklahoma, the Murchison interests of Dallas, and the McGaha interests of West Texas...
...The value of crude oil alone during 1953 amounted to more than $6 billion...
...So far, however, the oil industry and the public officials in the Southwest haven't given much attention to these economic threats from atomic industry...
...According to Dr...
...Here in Texas, for instance, people are already asking what the Lone Star State will do when atomic fuels begin to affect the state's chief source of tax income...
...However, the past has shown that new discoveries have resulted in growth, not decline...
Vol. 38 • March 1955 • No. 11
