Mesa Oil Field facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Mesa Oil Field |
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The Mesa Oil Field in Santa Barbara County, California. Other oil fields are shown in light gray.
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| Country | United States |
| Region | Santa Barbara south coast |
| Location | Santa Barbara County, California |
| Offshore/onshore | onshore |
| Operators | Town-lot field; numerous small operators |
| Field history | |
| Discovery | 1929 |
| Start of development | 1929 |
| Start of production | 1929 |
| Peak year | 1935 |
| Abandonment | 1976 |
| Production | |
| Estimated oil in place | 3.7 million barrels (~5.0×105 t) |
| Producing formations | Vaqueros Sandstone (Lower Miocene) |
The Mesa Oil Field was an oil field located entirely within the city of Santa Barbara, California, in the United States. It was found in 1929. The field was quickly developed and used, but it didn't last long. It turned out to be a fairly small amount of oil in just one type of rock.
While the oil field was active in the 1930s, building new homes in most of the Mesa neighborhood of Santa Barbara stopped. The field had two main areas that produced oil. These areas covered about 210 acres (0.85 square kilometers) in total. During its short life, the field produced 3.7 million barrels of oil.
Contents
Where the Oil Field Was Located
The Mesa oil field was in a small area on a flat-topped hill called a mesa. This area is now known as "The Mesa" neighborhood in Santa Barbara. The mesa itself is about 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) long from west to east. It is also about 3,000 feet (910 meters) wide from north to south.
The northern edge of the mesa is Lavigia Hill. Some oil wells were drilled on the southern slopes of this hill. The southern edge of the mesa is a steep cliff that overlooks the ocean. These cliffs are about 120 feet (37 meters) high at the western end. They get shorter towards the eastern end, near Santa Barbara City College. Before oil was found, the flat top of the mesa was used for farming.
The weather in this area is Mediterranean. This means it has mild, sometimes rainy winters and dry summers. Ocean breezes and morning fog keep the temperatures moderate. It almost never freezes here. The average yearly temperature is about 60°F (16°C). Plants can grow all year round.
Many other oil fields are in this region. The Summerland Oil Field is about 7 miles (11 kilometers) to the east. This field had the world's first oil wells drilled into the ocean. The large Ellwood Oil Field is about 10 miles (16 kilometers) to the west. About 7 miles (11 kilometers) to the southeast, in the Santa Barbara Channel, is the Dos Cuadras Oil Field. This field was the source of the 1969 Santa Barbara oil spill.
How the Oil Was Formed
The Mesa field's structure is quite simple. Oil was trapped in two folded rock layers. These layers were part of the sandy Miocene-age Vaqueros Sandstone formation. This rock layer was porous, meaning it had tiny holes that could hold oil. The oil was found at depths between 2,000 and 2,500 feet (610 and 760 meters). The two oil pockets were about two-thirds of a mile (1.1 kilometers) apart.
Above the Vaqueros Sandstone was a rock layer called the Rincon Shale. This layer was impermeable, meaning oil could not pass through it. Above that was the Monterey Formation. A thin layer of younger sediments, called the Santa Barbara Formation, was between the Monterey Formation and the ground surface.
Below the Vaqueros formation was the older Oligocene-age Sespe Formation. No oil was found in or under this layer. One well was drilled over 10,000 feet (3,000 meters) deep into the Sespe Formation. The Sespe and Vaqueros Formations together are very important for oil production in Southern California.
The oil from the Mesa field was medium to heavy. It was not considered very high quality. Early reports said it was 17 to 18 degrees on the Baumé scale. Later reports said it was 20 to 24 on the API gravity scale. It also had 0.45 percent sulfur. Because its quality was low, it was mainly used for fuel oil, road oil, and asphalt.
Wells in this field rarely produced oil for a long time. When a well first hit the oil-rich sandstone, it would produce a lot of oil quickly. But then, the production would drop fast. Later, the wells mostly produced water. The total amount of oil that could be taken out was limited. This was because oil was only found in one relatively thin rock layer. Even the wells that produced the most oil became too expensive to run within a few years.
History of Oil Production
The Mesa field was discovered when there were very few rules about drilling for oil in California. When oil was found, people usually drilled as much as they could. Cities like Los Angeles are built over many large oil fields. Smaller cities like Ventura and Santa Maria grew because of the oil industry.
Santa Barbara was different. It was one of the few cities in the region that did not want oil fields within its borders. Most people in Santa Barbara felt that the oil industry would harm the town's beauty and natural environment. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, the Summerland Oil Field had hundreds of oil derricks. These were on the beach and piers just 5 miles (8.0 kilometers) east of Santa Barbara. When the Summerland field tried to expand west, a group of people secretly tore down one of the derricks.
The first well drilled in the Mesa area was in 1922 by Puritan Oil Co. It was an exploratory well, meaning it was drilled to see if oil was there. It didn't produce enough oil to be profitable and was quickly abandoned. However, it suggested that there might be oil nearby.
In 1929, the huge Ellwood Oil Field was discovered. It was about 12 miles (19 kilometers) west of Santa Barbara, in a similar location on a blufftop mesa. This discovery led to a rush of new drilling along the coast. During this time, the first successful well for the Mesa field was drilled in May 1929. It was drilled by Olympic Refining Company in a neighborhood called Palisades.
By the end of that summer, there were 31 oil wells in this small area. This area had just been divided into lots for houses. These wells quickly ran dry. The area was abandoned by the next summer, having produced only 20,909 barrels of oil. However, new house construction completely stopped. Wooden derricks appeared on many small lots.
The sight of these derricks, clearly visible from Santa Barbara harbor, led to the first anti-oil protest in Santa Barbara. But a rule had been made that allowed oil production on the Mesa. So, the protests did not stop the drilling.
Three months after the Palisades area was abandoned, in September 1930, drillers found the Vista del Oceano area. This area produced much more oil. It was about two-thirds of a mile (1.1 kilometers) east of Palisades. It was on the hillside overlooking the Mesa and the ocean.
An even more productive area, Fair Acres, started in March 1934. This area was south of Cliff Drive and extended all the way to the bluffs overlooking the beach. Sixty-five wells were drilled in the Fair Acres area by 1940. The well that produced the most oil was "Cole No. 1." Oil gushed out of this well at an uncontrolled rate of 1,500 barrels a day for two weeks. After that, it was set to produce about one-tenth of that rate. The Fair Acres and Vista del Oceano areas are next to each other and are geologically similar. So, the California Department of Conservation groups them together as the "Main Area."
The Mesa field was entirely developed by small companies. The land was divided into small plots before oil was discovered. This meant that each plot owner could drill on their own land. They didn't have to worry about the best way to space wells across the whole field. In 1934, there were 34 different companies operating on 35 leases. The largest company had only six wells.
Even the best wells started to produce less oil by the late 1930s. By 1940, only 22 out of 107 drilled wells were still producing. They produced an average of about 10 barrels of oil per day. The field had not been very profitable. One expert wrote in 1940 that it was doubtful if the field had made back the money invested. He said that like most fields with many small plots, there were 10 wells where one would have been enough.
Building houses started again after the Second World War. This happened as wells were abandoned and pits were filled in. The last well was closed in 1972. The field was officially abandoned in 1976.
Images for kids
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The Mesa neighborhood of Santa Barbara, showing the approximate center of the field's main area of production. In the 1930s there were no houses here, but dozens of oil derricks.
