WorldWide Drilling Resource

Oil/Water Exploration by Harold White I had years and years of WWDR magazines stored when my house burned just before Christmas. My collection will be missed. I used them like files when I got a business call on a subject I had written about. I would file it on the sub- ject page in the book. Now, I have lost all the information from people who have called in for help locating places to drill water, gas, oil, etc. I would appreciate if they called me back. Sean introduced an old man to me at the coffee shop recently. He said he knew my father, that he was a nice man who spoke a lot of his kids and what they were doing; he was a proud father and one of the best water locators the man had ever met. He then asked me if it was really true my father could tell water from oil under- ground. I replied it was true, saying he was an honest man and a good father. I then thanked the man for being a friend. In another conversation, I spoke with a guy who worked in the Bakken oil fields. We were talking about horizontal drilling - how it is drilled in the average level known to have oil fractures in it, so they hit hard and soft spots. While drilling, if the soft spots had oil in them, the process would clean them up and the oil would flow faster from them. Sometimes, fracturing can go through rock layers to a soft layer, meaning porosity in a strata, and it will let the oil flow. I don’t expect to get much fluid out of solid rock, no matter what is done to it. The statements and comments in this article are based on information and ref- erences believed to be true and factual. If you have any questions or comments, please forward them to me in care of WWDR . Harold Harold White may be contacted via e-mail to michele@worldwidedrillingresource.com Welcome to the world of minerals! Minerals are naturally occurring inorganic substances with defi- nite and predictable chemical composition and phys- ical properties. They are found all around the globe and to a greater extent throughout the entire universe. There are around 4000 known minerals and more are being discovered each year. Every mineral is unique and has its own history, and many are used by people in different ways every day. Each month we will take a glimpse inside the mineral world and uncover the riches of some of these alluring substances. Aluminum is the most abundant metal in earth’s crust. It is sil- ver, relatively soft, ductile, malleable, and found mostly within ore, primarily the clayey rock bauxite, alongside other minerals. When it is alloyed with magnesium, copper, and silicon, it forms a much stronger metal. The first suc- cessful extraction from ore was in 1825 by Danish chemist Hans Christian Oersted. Aluminum is most often used as a manufacturing metal in the transportation industry, while also being produced for packaging, building, electrical applications, and many other uses. Despite alu- minum being present in a great number of rocks and ores around the world, it is not eco- nomically feasible to extract the metal from them, resulting in most of the world’s aluminum supply being mined in only a few places - Australia, Guinea, Jamaica, Brazil, and India. While America does produce some aluminum, the country’s import reliance has increased as pri- mary production has decreased. Andalusite was named by Jean-Claude Delamétherie in 1798 for its supposed type locality - Andalusia, Spain; however, the type locality where this mineral was first described is not Andalusia, but rather El Cardoso in the Guadalajara region, so the mineral’s name was founded on a geographical error. Andalusite is a rock-forming mineral, which has a number of useful physical properties. It has the ability to withstand high temperatures without alteration, so it is often mined for high-temperature ce- ramics used in furnaces, kilns, and incinerators. Andalusite is also used to make the white porcelain on many spark plugs. A variety of andalusite called chiastolite contains black particles of graphite, which are pushed aside by crystal growth within a rock undergoing metamorphism, creating a dis- tinctive cross-shaped pattern adored by people for its use in religious jewelry. The World of Minerals 17 WorldWide Drilling Resource ® MAY 2017