Uintah may fuel Utah's economy

BONANZA, Uintah County — On a dusty acre of state-owned land, at the end of the paved portion of an unnamed road near the Utah-Colorado border, towers a structure that could soon play a major role in Utah's economy.

Owned by the Uintah County-based Oil Tech Inc., the retort can create 24 barrels of premium crude oil per day from rocks that, despite their name, actually contain no oil. And it can all be made, according to company representatives, for less than $20 a barrel.

Although those claims have not been verified in large-scale production, Oil Tech's biomass fuel production is something that needs to be encouraged if the state is to play a more prominent role in the nation's fuel production, Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. said Saturday after touring the retort. It also drives home the quickly burgeoning need for more skilled workers and improved infrastructure within the Uinta Basin.

Huntsman, along with many of his senior staff members, some legislators, federal and local officials and corporate representatives, spent Friday and Saturday touring Duchesne and Uintah counties with a particular eye toward energy resource development.

"This dust bowl covers a lot of valuable natural resources that will power our economy for a long time to come," Huntsman said. "It's the proverbial boom and bust economy, but we're about to see an upswing. People need to understand that this area is poised to become a major player."

Among the most optimistic about the prospects is Byron Merrell, Oil Tech's technical adviser, who took Huntsman's group on a tour of his facility Saturday afternoon. Then again, he is also on the ground floor of a technology that could, if their promises hold true, create an oil business from rocks that used to be considered waste product in oil drilling and were only called "oil shale" because prospectors were trying to capitalize on oil frenzy in the early 20th century.

"There is actually no oil in oil shale," but instead the rocks contain a black substance that, while it looks like oil, is actually just compacted plant matter, Merrell said. "We have to literally manufacture it, so it's a 'sim' fuel — a man-made fuel. It's fresh oil."

Although not viscous enough to grease an engine, the crude produced from oil shale can be refined into gasoline. Additionally, the shale, which does not contain biomass, can be used to heat the next batch of oil shale or sold for a multitude of other uses, from filling old mine shafts to manufacturing wallboard, Merrell said.