Part 15

Derricks and Mines

_by_ George B. Griswold

New Mexico is a mineral-rich state. The gross production value of oil, gas, and minerals was $671 million during 1963, making the state the sixth ranking mineral producer in the nation. New Mexico ranks among other states as follows: first in the production of potash, uranium, perlite, and carbon dioxide; third in helium; fourth in copper; fifth in natural gas and liquids; and seventh in petroleum. Important amounts of zinc, lead, gold, silver, magnesium compounds, coal, gypsum, pumice, and salt are also produced from deposits within New Mexico. The oil and gas industry holds a dominant position in the state, accounting for almost two thirds of the value of minerals produced.

OIL AND GAS

Most of New Mexico’s oil and gas are produced in the southeastern part, south and east of Roswell. The bustling towns of Hobbs, Artesia, and Lovington, as well as Roswell, are headquarters for the many oil companies and the associated service and supply organizations operating in the area. Oil and gas are produced from numerous reservoirs, called _fields_ or _pools_, in Paleozoic sediments ranging from Ordovician to Permian in age. From the standpoint of production, the Eunice-Monument field (lying between these two towns) is the largest, having produced more than 250 million barrels of oil. Other important fields are Hobbs, Vacuum, Langlie Mattix, Denton, and Jalmat. All these fields produce a considerable amount of gas associated directly with the oil.

When driving an automobile through southeast New Mexico, a layman finds it difficult to comprehend the immensity of the petroleum industry of that region. This is due to the scattering of wells over a large area. Seldom are wells spaced closer than one to every ten acres, even in the most productive fields. There are, in fact, some 16,000 wells in this part of New Mexico, ranging in depth from less than 1000 feet to 17,555 feet.

The other oil- and gas-producing area of the state is in the northwest, in the San Juan Basin. Farmington serves as the base of operations for most of this activity. In 1962, there were 7378 wells in the area, 1770 of which were producing oil and gas and 5608 producing gas only. Most of the San Juan Basin production is from Cretaceous sandstones, in contrast to the southeast where the oil and gas are derived from Paleozoic sediments. The development of the San Juan Basin production is relatively new; most of the wells have been drilled since World War II. The petroleum industry can be proud of the great help it has given to the development of this once-almost-forgotten part of the state.

The methods of finding and producing oil and gas have come a long way from the “boom town” days when wells were drilled for the most part on pure hunches and hopes. The exploration and exploitation of petroleum are now highly specialized technologies. All branches of the geologic and geophysical sciences are brought into play to piece together a comprehensive picture of all the factors which may have made a certain area favorable for the accumulation of oil or gas. These factors include such things as the age, thickness, and permeability of the sedimentary rocks, the structure, old shorelines, and buried reefs. Once a target is selected, a drilling rig is moved onto the location to prove or disprove the theory. This is the costly step of finding oil. A single 10,000-foot hole may cost $350,000, and some individual wells in New Mexico have cost more than $1 million to drill. If the well is in a completely untested area, it is called a “wildcat.” Once a discovery is made, then the land around the wildcat is explored by “offset” wells until the complete extent of the new field is proved.

During 1962, 1666 wells were drilled to an average depth of 5153 feet. The average drilling cost was $71,000 a well, representing a total investment of almost $120 million in a single year! Most of these wells were of the development (offset) type, but even then, 27 per cent were dry. During 1962, 295 true wildcats were drilled; of these, only 46 found oil or gas—about two out of every thirteen.

The story of oil just begins with the discovery of a well. Various special “completion” operations are applied to the oil-producing horizon so as to increase the flow into the well. The most common techniques are either by “acidizing,” pumping acid into the formation to increase flow by enlarging the pores in the rock, or by “hydrafracing,” whereby actual cracks are induced in the formation by pumping oil from the surface back into the well under very high pressure. After the well is “completed,” it may be a natural-flowing well if sufficient gas is associated with the oil. If sufficient gas is not present, then the well is pumped.

In recent years, considerable success has been achieved in revitalizing old fields where production had dropped below the point of economic operation. These fields are reactivated by forcing either water or gas down selected wells within the field, thereby forcing stagnated oil within the producing zone toward the other wells. This technique is called _secondary recovery_. Many fields will produce more oil under the secondary recovery program than they did during their primary life.

Once the oil is on the surface, it passes through separators to remove any admixed gas from the oil. The gas is sent into pipelines while the oil is sent to storage tanks called _tank batteries_. Periodically, the oil is drawn from the tank batteries where it is transported by pipeline or rail to refineries. The great bulk of the crude oil leaves New Mexico for refining via a major pipeline network extending through Texas to both the Gulf and East coasts. Some oil is refined in New Mexico, however. Oil refineries in Artesia, Bloomfield, Ciniza, Farmington, and Monument have a combined capacity to treat some 30,000 barrels (42 gallons a barrel) of crude oil a day. On the other hand, practically all the natural gas is treated in New Mexico so as to recover its liquid petroleum constituents before sending it out of the state by pipeline.

MINING

The mining industry of New Mexico dates back to the days of Spanish rule. Copper was mined from the Santa Rita mine as early as 1800 for shipment to Mexico for use in coinage. Significant mining in New Mexico did not commence, however, until the late 1800’s. There are three major centers today: Carlsbad, potash; Silver City area, copper, zinc, and lead; and Grants, uranium.

The potash mining east of Carlsbad, a $75 million-a-year industry employing more than 3600 persons, is the largest operation of its kind in the world. Six mining companies are active in the area, and a seventh is developing yet another mine. _Potash_ is a word used to denote various potassium compounds. The principal ore mineral at Carlsbad is sylvanite, a mixture of potassium chloride and sodium chloride (common salt). The ore contains the equivalent of 21 to 25 per cent potassium oxide (K₂O).[6] Another ore mineral, known as _langbeinite_, a double salt of potassium and magnesium sulfate, is also mined.

The potash ores occur as horizontal beds sandwiched between thick salt and anhydrite layers. These beds are the result of evaporation of large quantities of salt waters during the latter part of the Permian period some 240 million years ago. The potash-bearing horizons now are buried from 900 to 1800 feet below the surface. The discovery of potash in southeast New Mexico was almost by accident. In 1925, the Snowden and McSweeny Company drilled a wildcat oil test a few miles east of Carlsbad. The hole was dry, but potash minerals were detected in the drill cuttings. The discovery generated considerable interest because the United States was forced to import most of its potash prior to this time. Further drilling proved the existence of tremendous deposits of potassium salts in that area.

The potash mines are among the most highly mechanized of the mineral industry. Access to the buried deposits is gained by vertical shafts. Actual mining is now done to a large extent by continuous miners, machines which bore or rip the potash ore from the face and load it into shuttle cars in one continuous operation. The shuttle cars then transport the ore to conveyor belts which move it to the shafts for hoisting. Working conditions and safety are excellent and have led to high productivity from these mines.

The potash ore is refined or processed by fractional crystallation or flotation. These plants remove most of the unwanted sodium chloride and other gangue minerals to produce high-quality potassium chloride or sulfate. After processing, the potash salts are stored in giant bins to await shipment by rail to the major agriculture areas of the United States. The Carlsbad mines produce some 15 million tons of ore a year which, when refined, produces 4 million tons of marketable potassium salts having a K₂O equivalent of 2.5 million tons.

Uranium mining is the newest major industry in New Mexico. The boom started in 1950 with the discovery of uranium ore west of Grants by a Navajo sheep rancher named Paddy Martinez. This discovery started one of the most extensive exploration and development campaigns in all mining history. By 1957, the area had proved uranium reserves accounting for more than half of the entire reserve of the nation. These discoveries will make this country self-sufficient in this vital atomic energy metal for years to come. Five mills were built that are capable of producing “yellow cake” (almost pure uranium oxide) from uranium ores containing as little as 0.20 per cent U₃O₈. Four mills are located in the Grants area, ranging in capacity from 1500 to 4000 tons a day. The fifth mill, rated at 500 tons a day, is at Shiprock.

There are numerous mines, ranging from tiny two-man operations up to great mines producing more than 1000 tons a day. The most prolific producing area is the Ambrosia Lake District north of Grants; most of these mines are underground. Probably the largest single uranium mine, however, is the open-pit Jackpile-Paguate mine of the Anaconda Company on the Laguna Indian Reservation some thirty miles east of Grants. The mine uses electric shovels capable of loading eight cubic yards of ore at a time into large diesel trucks.

Copper is produced from the Chino mine located at Santa Rita, about fifteen miles east of Silver City. This mine, operated by Kennecott Copper Corporation, is the showpiece of the New Mexico minerals industry. The copper ore is low grade, containing only sixteen pounds a ton of the red metal, but the deposit is immense, allowing the mining of 22,500 tons a day. The Chino is by far the largest single mining operation in the state. A large concentrator and smelter are located at Hurley, about ten miles southwest of the pit.

The Chino pit is a spectacular sight for its scenic setting and its sheer size. The deposit is located below the Kneeling Nun, a famous natural statue formed by the erosion of a rhyolite flow which caps a high mesa. The pit covers almost one square mile and is 800 feet deep. The mining is highly mechanized. Large rotary drills make blast holes twelve inches in diameter into which explosives are loaded. A single blast may break 100,000 tons of rock. The ore is loaded with 8-cubic-yard shovels into large trucks carrying from 25 to 65 tons each. The trucks transport the ore to an inclined skipway on the west end of the pit. The skip then carries the ore up to the train level where it is transferred into railroad cars for shipment to the mill. Waste rock, too low-grade to justify sending to the mill, is transported to the very top of the skip way, where it is trucked to the dumps. At Chino, much of the waste rock contains some copper. The amount is small, but a part of it can be recovered by leaching-percolating water down through the rock to dissolve the copper. At the bottom of the dumps, the copper-rich water is collected and sent through precipitating tanks containing scrap iron. The copper plates out on the iron, forming metallic copper. The dump-leaching program alone at Chino is a substantial enterprise.

The concentrator and smelter at Hurley is the facility which reduces the low-grade ore into pure metal. The concentrator first crushes and grinds the ore, then recovers the copper-bearing minerals (principally chalcocite and chalcopyrite) by flotation. The concentrate of these copper sulfides is taken to the smelter to make metallic copper.

North and west of the Chino mine are important deposits of zinc and lead. Two underground mines are now active: the Hanover of the New Jersey Zinc Company and the Kearney—Pewabic of American—Peru Mining Company. Although dwarfed by the Chino mine, these are important producers.

Copper, potash, and uranium are not the only mining operations of New Mexico. Perlite is recovered from deposits near No Agua in Taos County and just north of Grants. Two new gypsum plants are now operating northeast of Albuquerque, and a cement plant is located east of that city. High-grade copper veins are worked south of Lordsburg. Coal mining is being reactivated, with producing mines near Gallup, Fruitland, and Raton. A new molybdenum mine is under development east of Questa. New Mexico’s mineral industry is on a broad and firm base.

Mines and derricks are ever-present aspects of New Mexico’s landscapes; they are seen by every citizen of the state and every tourist as he travels across the plains, valleys, and mountains. The derricks and the mine openings are merely surface features through which the vast wealth of the underground is exploited, but they are a monetarily important part of New Mexico’s scenery, rocks, and history.

Enchanting Landscapes

_by_ Frank E. Kottlowski

The visitor and the native may be well acquainted with the more famous scenic places in New Mexico. Most of these are National or State Parks or Monuments—glistening dunes of White Sands, sandstone cliffs of El Morro, canyons eroded in volcanic rocks of Bandelier, the recent volcano of Capulin Mountain, multicolored sinkholes at Bottomless Lakes, grotesque carvings of volcanic rocks at City of Rocks, and the black tongues of cooled lava in the Valley of Fires State Park near Carrizozo.

Many of the lesser-known spectacular scenic areas are off the beaten path, far from the seventy-mile-an-hour Interstate highways. Even a brief description of all would fill a thick book. But near the most traveled routes are numerous enchanting landscapes. The traveler from the midwest or east, driving U.S. Highway 66 (Interstate 40) breaks over the edge of the “caprock” a few miles east of the New Mexico—Texas line. Atop the caprock is Llano Estacado, the Staked Plains, a level surface stretching along the southeast edge of New Mexico eastward into Texas. As seen south of Tucumcari near Ragland, east of Fort Sumner near Taiban, or east of Roswell near Kenna and Caprock, the bluffs of the Llano Estacado are topped by caprock, a cliff of white caliche-limestone as much as forty feet thick in places. Below, on gentle to steep slopes reaching northward toward Tucumcari or westward toward Fort Sumner and Roswell, are the varicolored red, purple, green, and gray shales and sandstones of Triassic age. Red Lake near Taiban on U.S. Highway 60-84 lies in the red muds of these Triassic rocks.

South of Tucumcari, rising boldly from the red-earth lowlands draining to the Canadian River, are Tucumcari Mountain and Mesa Redonda, and to the northwest the long buff cliffs of Mesa Rica. The latter mesa lies north of Interstate 40 as far west as Newkirk. Patches of the white caprock caliche-limestone cap these eastern New Mexico sentinels, whereas in other localities, the brown Dakota Sandstone tops the buttes and is underlain by pink Jurassic sandstones, with the mesa bases made up of the Triassic redbeds.

Near Santa Rosa, Interstate 40 dips down into the narrow green valley of Rio Pecos. Roadcuts lining the steep hills into the city show the red and brown sandstones and shales of the Triassic beds.

Driving westward from Santa Rosa, one crosses rolling hills near Clines Corners, then dips gently down into the northern part of the Estancia Basin near Moriarty. To the north on the horizon are the snow-capped peaks of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. From Moriarty, Interstate 40 pulls slowly upward toward Edgewood into the eastern foothills of the Sandia Mountains, the grassy plains giving way to juniper and piñon groves.

From the downgrade into Tijeras Canyon, State Highway 10 leads north to San Antonito and the turnoff to Sandia Crest. The crest road winds up canyon walls, on sloping limestone mesas, up through thick stands of ponderosa pine, aspen, and, near the top, Engelmann spruce and corkbark fir. Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep may be seen off the road on the high crags. From Sandia Crest, 10,678 feet above sea level, much of north-central New Mexico is visible; Mount Taylor to the west, the Nacimiento and Jemez mountains to the northwest, the mighty Sangre de Cristo Mountains to the northeast, and countless ranges to the south and southwest. The city of Albuquerque is spread out at the base of the Sandias, and the twisting north-south channel of the Rio Grande stretches, glistening, as far left and right as one can see.

From Tijeras, Interstate 40 plunges into Tijeras Canyon, slicing through vertical roadcuts in Pennsylvanian limestones and shales, then through the ancient Precambrian granite. At the canyons mouth, the road levels off on the broad alluvial plain on which much of east Albuquerque is built, although the “downtown” is really down, in the valley of the Rio Grande.

Westward, Interstate 40 rolls up out of the valley, crosses windswept plains spotted with black volcanic cones, in and out of the shallow brown valley of Rio Puerco, and then to the red-cliff-bordered valley of Rio San Jose. Cliffs are of brown, buff, and light-gray Jurassic sandstones, with the valley carved in Triassic redbeds. Near Laguna, on the north side of the valley, white gypsum of the Todilto Formation crops out. Then through the pink Jurassic cliffs the canyon winds, and near New Laguna, the highway is bordered by the varicolored, uranium-bearing Morrison beds, which are overlain by brown sandstones and black shales of Cretaceous age.

But as Interstate 40 approaches Grants, the dominant feature is black frozen lava. The mesas surrounding Mount Taylor are capped by black basalt, built up in many layers, each individual flows, and loose blocks tumble down on the hillsides. Young basalt, twisted and wrinkled as if it were still hot, winds along the valley; just east of Grants, a huge “field” of this recent basalt stretches southward beyond the horizon. And above all looms Mount Taylor, remnant of an ancient volcano, snow-capped in winter, towering 11,389 feet above sea level.

At Casa Blanca, southeast of Mount Taylor, State Road 23 leads south to Acoma Pueblo. Eleven miles to the southwest, Enchanted Mesa, _Katsim_ as it is called by the Acomas, towers 450 feet above the surrounding valley floor. This sheer-cliffed rock is built by layers of (from the base to the top) pink and white Entrada Sandstone, gray Todilto limestone, pink and green Summerville beds, a massive cliff of light-tan Zuni Sandstone, and a cap of yellow-brown Dakota Sandstone.

The top of Enchanted Mesa is inaccessible by normal means. Legend has it that once the Acomas lived there, and there are Indian ruins up on the isolated rim. A terrific rain and lightning storm, one summer day, sent huge waterfalls down the sides of the mesa, tearing away large blocks of sandstone, and destroyed the trail to the top, a series of narrow zigzag ledges and toeholds in crevasses. Thus the Acoma Indians moved a few miles to the southwest to Acoma, onto the top of another sheer cliff, a rock fortress carved in Zuni Sandstone and capped by Dakota Sandstone.

Southwest of Grants, the forested Zuni Mountains rise, bordered on the north by a valley cut in Triassic redbeds and on the east by the recent black basalt flows. The hurrying traveler will follow Interstate 40 to Gallup around the north edge of the Zuni dome, flanked on the north by the spectacular pink, red, brown, and gray cliffs of Jurassic and Cretaceous sandstones. If one has time, take the low road, State Highways 53 and 36, around the southern edge of the Zunis. For almost twenty miles, passing through San Rafael, the paved highway parallels the west edge of the Grants black basalt flow; then up over low ridges and past black cinder cones toward El Morro. In the lava tunnels, perpetual ice stays hidden from the sun; these can be visited at Ice Caves.

El Morro, Inscription Rock, with its towering cliffs of Zuni Sandstone, overlooks peaceful green valleys; farther west, the red and brown sandstones are carved into many mesas and buttes near Zuni Pueblo. Then northward to Gallup, swinging around the west edge of the Zuni Mountains, the roller-coaster highway, State 36, cuts through ponderosa pine country, bordered by Cretaceous brown sandstones, black shales, and coal beds.

Northeast of Gallup eight miles is Kit Carson’s Cave, a gaping door on the face of a massive cliff of Jurassic sandstone. A pool of cool water lies along its floor. The three-and-a-half-mile drive north of Interstate 40 is through a vast broken country of sandstone spires, pyramids, cliffs, and ledges carved in the Jurassic rocks. Near Gallup, the drab coal-bearing Cretaceous beds form the landscapes, but westward near the Arizona line, erosion has cut down again to the brilliantly colored Jurassic rocks, and Interstate 40 is escorted westward into the Grand Canyon State by cliffs of white and pink sandstone.

Californians crossing New Mexico in the winter are likely to travel U.S. Highway 70-80 (Interstate 10) eastward. New Mexico is entered just before Steins Pass, which is channeled through the tan and green volcanic rocks of the Peloncillo Mountains. Then down across the mud and salt marshes of Alkali Flats lying in the Animas Valley and up onto the north edge of the Pyramid Mountains into Lordsburg. Mine dumps dot the Pyramids, and the ghost mining town of Shakespeare lies amid the purple volcanic rocks.