Geographic Setting
The Kern River Oil Field covers an area of 10,750 acres (43.5 km2) in a rough oval extending over the low hills north-northeast of Bakersfield, hills which are now almost completely barren except for oil rigs, drilling pads and associated equipment. This area is the densest operational oil development in the state of California: Midway-Sunset, which has more wells, is almost three times as large in surface area, for a lower overall density. Elevations on the Kern River Oil Field range from approximately 400 to 1,000 feet (300 m), rising towards the northeast, and the Kern River flows south of the field, from east to west, from the Sierra Nevada into the city of Bakersfield.
The oil field is one of many contiguous oil fields along the eastern edge of the southern San Joaquin Valley, lying between the Kern Front field to the northwest and the Kern Bluff field to the southeast, on the other side of the Kern River. Directly north of the Kern River field is the large Mount Poso Oil Field, entirely in the Sierra foothills, and to the northeast is the Round Mountain Oil Field.
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