This paper was prepared at the request of Capt. A. F. Lucas, Chair man ofthe Institute's Committee on Petroleum and Gas, as a preliminary discussion ofthe fuel oils which are used in the Southwest, giving their composition, uses, prices, etc. Should it afterward be found desirable, these observations may beextended over a larger area. In this connection, I suggest that samples of allkinds of fuel oils, including various tars, from all over the country, becollected and sent to some testing laboratory for examination. We would be gladto extend the facilities of the laboratory of the Bureau of Economic Geologyand Technology, at the University of Texas, for this purpose, and to do thework free of all expenses. After such examinations are made and the resultsclassified and studied, it would be possible to suggest specifications underwhich fuel oils should be purchased, and to arrive at some conclusionsrespecting the uniformity of such specifications, with due allowance forclimatic and other more or less local conditions. While such specifications donot now depart from a common standard anything like as much as specificationsfor illuminating oils do, yet there are discrepancies which should not exist.Some of these discrepancies are of lessening importance, due to the pronouncedtendency to distill every crude oil that can be distilled with profit, and tosend residues into the market for fuel oil. Residues from the refineries are ofa more uniform chemical composition and physical nature than many of the crudeoils that go direct into the fuel market. The lower flash-point oils are disappearing from the fuel trade and in place ofthem we are getting oils that do not flash below 220? F., nor burn under 320?F. In the Southwest, it has not been long since we had fuel oils that flashedas low as 110? F, and the average flash point over a considerable period was151? F. Now we are using oil that flashes at about 30? lower than the formerburning point, which was 258? F. In other words, the flash point has risen, onthe average, 100?; and the burning point about 75?. AIME 048–47