August 2, 1918.

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN.

235

T?or Sale.—About 100 Cast Iron Floor

I* PLATES, 4 ft. by 4 ft., with | in. lip all round. About 100 DITTO,
5 ft. by 2 ft. 6 in., no lip, all 1 in. thick. A large quantity of good Second-
hand Lift WIRE ROPE, in coils, mostly about 1 in. diameter.

GEO. COHEN, SON’S & CO., 600, Commercial-road, London, E. 14.

Ammonia Plant, complete, for imme-

diate delivery, comprising scrubber, filters, gasometer, W. and C.I.

tanks, receivers, piping, valves, girders, Babcock Wilcox boiler and water
softener, &c— RICHARD SIZER LTD., 82, Mark-lane, E.C. 3.

T?or Sale.—In good working condition, a
1* Robey Coupled Compound- Class E HORIZONTAL ENGINE,
16§ in. h.p., 26£ in. l.p., 36 in. stroke.

One Scott & Mountain d.c. GENERATOR, 36 in. by 12 in., suitable for
500 volts, 300 amps.

One d.c. MOTOR.

OCEAN COAL CO. LTD., Treorchy, Glam.

TXTinding Engine, with 10 in. cylinders,

V V portable or loco, type, with or without drums, 4 ft. 6 in. to 5 ft.
diameter; also suitable BOILER, required urgently.—Offers to THE
BROAD LANE COLLIERY LTD., 5, Edmund-street, Birmingham.

J. W. BAIRD AND COMPANY,

PITWOOD IMPORTERS,
WEST HARTLEPOOL.

YEARLY CONTRACTS ENTERED INTO WITH COLLIERIES.

OSBECK & COMPANY LIMITED,
PIT-TIMBER MERCHANTS,
NEWCASTLE-ON-TYNE.

SUPPLY ALL KINDS OF COLLIERY TIMBER.
Telegrams—“ Osbecks, Newcastle-on-Tyne.”

*** For other Miscellaneous Advertisements see Last
White Page.

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AND
Journal of the Coal and Iron Trades.

Joint Editors—
J. V. ELSDEN, D.Sc. (Lond.), F.G.S.

HUBERT GREENWELL, F.S.S., Assoc.M.I.M.E.

(At present on Active Service).

LONDON. FRIDAY, AUGUS1 2, 1918.

The demand for all kinds of fuel on the London
Coal Exchange continues to be far in excess of the
supply. The depots are working steadily.

Reports from all the markets indicate a serious
shortage of fuel and the improbability of any
improved output in the near future. So strong is
the tone on the Tyne that best Blyth steams are now
quoted up to 75s. to neutrals. Durham bunkers are
exceedingly scarce, and gas coal is strongly pressed
for. In Lancashire, Yorkshire and the Midlands the
demands on the collieries are almost overwhelming,
and very little business in surplus lots is possible.
The markets are nominal to a very great extent.
Supplies are difficult to procure in Cardiff, and the
coming holiday will make matters worse. The position
in Scotland is practically unchanged.

In the Tyne coal chartering market a fair amount
of tonnage is on offer for Sweden. Loading turns
are full for the next two or three weeks, and the
same sort of difficulty is experienced in Cardiff.

Major A. Cooper Key, H.M. Inspector of Explo-
sives, records in his annual report for 1917 that
accidents with explosives numbered 701, as compared
with 641 in 1916 and 485 in 1915. There were 54
deaths and 330 persons injured, as compared with
195 and 598.

The National Council of Miner workers other than
Miners had an interview with the Prime Minister
regarding their claim for an advance of wages. It is
understood that a decision will be sent to the council.

A new Order by the Board of Trade specifies the
areas from which mining districts may draw their
supplies of pit wood and also fixes maximum prices,
both for imported and home-grown pitwood, coming
into force at once. Permits will be necessary before
pitwood can be moved from one area to another.

The South Wales miners, through their represen-
tatives, announced that they will take a three days
holiday on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday next.
The miners in some of the other coal fields have
arranged to take only one day.

Sir A. Stanley, in the House of Commons on Wed-
nesday, refused to alter any essential point of the
new restrictions on fuel and lighting.

The committee concerned with the home production
of fuel oil has reported in favour of the carbonisa-
tion of cannel coal in existing vertical retorts at gas
works, and against the erection of batteries of low
temperature retorts.

The Imperial Mineral Resources Committee will
be incorporated by Royal Charter. Sir Richard
Redmayne is the chairman, and representatives
have been nominated by the Dominion and Indian
Governments.

The President of the Board of Trade has arranged
to meet the London members of Parliament on Tues-
day next relative to the fuel and lighting restrictions.
He will meet the country members on Wednesday.

The paper read by Mr. Edgar C.

Low Evans at the annual meeting of the
Temperature Society of Chemical Industry at
Carbonisation. Bristol last week serves the useful
purpose of summarising the present
position of the problem of low temperature
distillation of coal. This question is being investi-
gated by the' slow and laborious process of trial
and error for the simple reason that there are
still many missing links in our knowledge of
the chemistry and constitution of coal. Perhaps
one of these days these lacunae will be filled up by
a brilliant and far-reaching discovery, and one of
the most valuable aids to this result is a clear per-
ception of the particular stages where present
methods are found wanting. So far as present
experience goes, the problem appears to be rather
of an engineering than of a chemical nature, and
we are confronted with the familiar difficulty of»
adopting laboratory processes to works on a com-
mercial scale. Mr. Evans traces the history of this
question from earliest times. Low temperature
carbonisation is, indeed, no new notion, but investi-
* gation along these lines has been comparatively
neglected owing to the fact that both in the coking
and gas industries the products of high temperature
distillation alone were commercially successful, since
in the one case hard coke, and in the other a maxi-
mum yield of gas were essential considerations.

The chief stimulus to low temperature research, in
the first instance, lay in the recognised disadvantages
of bituminous coal as a fuel, and the commercial
prospects of any process whereby the double purpose
could be secured of manufacturing an easily com-
bustible coke and recovering marketable by-products
in the process. Since the war the growing need for
an increased supply of oil fuel has added a new
importance to these researches. To the advantages
of smokeless fuel and the elimination of waste, there
is now to be added the paramount necessity of solving
the problem of maintaining an adequate supply of
light oils suitable for use in internal combustion
engines, and fuel oil for the Navy.

It is unlikely that a satisfactory process of low-
temperature distillation will be achieved without the
further aid both of the chemist and the engineer. As
Mr. Evans remarks, the whole phenomena of coal
carbonisation are intimately bound up with the con-
stitution of the coal that is treated. More knowledge
is required of the nature of the raw material, and
although progress in this direction is being made, we
are still far from a complete solution of the problem.
To the chemists who are engaged upon this branch
of the enquiry, the engineers are looking expectantly
for further aid. Again, our knowledge of the theory
of the coking process is still incomplete, and in this
case, also, it would appear that further laboratory
work is needed before the exact nature of the
chemistry of the coking chamber is properly under-
stood. Mr. Evans gives in his papei* an admirable
resume of the more important work that has been
done in these directions in this country, in America,
and in Germany, dwelling particularly upon the
distribution of temperature in different parts of the
oven.

Physically, low temperature carbonisation ^differs
somewhat from high temperature processes, and the
following are the main points of distinction. In the
first place, at low temperatures the rate of transmis-
sion o'f heat through the charge is greatly reduced,
and for this reason the maximum thickness which
can be treated in stationary charges is limited to
4 or 5 in. This consideration results in an important
increase in the cost of treatment. Secondly, the
resistance of the fused zone to the passage of gas is
largely increased at low temperatures, and serious
gas pressures are in danger of being developed in
consequence. Thirdly, the time during which the
coal is in a state of semi-fusion is considerably
prolonged. That is to say, the pasty stage lasts
sufficiently long for large cell cavities to be formed,
with the result that an expanded, cellular coke is
produced, and in the case of some resinous coals the
gas outlet is liable to become completely choked
unless room is left in the retorts for this expansion.
But leaving a free space at the top of the coal
charge increases the amount of air left in contact
with the coal, and contributes to the production of
a friable coke.

These and other problems have engaged the
attention of investigators, and have led to a number
of processes designed for their solution. The author
classifies these under three main heads, viz., inter-
mittently charged retorts externally heated, inter-
mittently charged retorts internally heated, and
continuous processes. There are also others, which
have not yet been tested on a commercial scale. It
would be far from our purpose to follow the author
in his detailed account of these various systems, but
his criticisms of their relative merits will be closely
studied by those who are interested in the engi-
neering aspects of this question. He then turns to
the economics of low temperature carbonisation, and
coal owners should note what he has to say upon the
question of poor qualities of coal which in their raw
state are almost unusable. There are, in fact, large
areas of coal which at present are unworkable from
a commercial point of view; and, in the author’s view,
their economic salvation might be effected by a well-
designed system of low temperature carbonisation.

For the moment, however, greater interest centres
about such questions^as the treatment of cannel coal,
which subject has lately been fully treated in a paper
read before the Institution of Petroleum Technolo-
gists. The treatment of bituminous small coal is
another matter of present interest, and the author
goes fully into the details of cost of a plant for this
purpose. Estimates of profit and loss of this nature
must, however, be of a somewhat speculative
character. The author bases his figures upon the
use of high-grade small coal; but it would be
unwise to assume that all small coal would produce
similar results. Coal owners contemplating the
adoption of low temperature carbonisation must not
base their judgment upon processes which are
working profitably elsewhere. Before the adoption
of any particular system, it is essential to make a
preliminary investigation of the nature of the coal to
be treated. Some systems will work well with
cannel, but are unsuitable for coking coals. There
is also the question of disposal of the smokeless fuel,
which has not yet been satisfactorily solved. The
best that can yet be said, perhaps, is that low tem-
perature carbonisation is still en pleine evolution, and
will probably only emerge from that condition after
still further experimental work of a laborious
character. So far but little has been done in the
direction of the fractional distillation of coal on a
commercial scale, which the author believes to possess
considerable promise.

The debate in the House of Commons
The Coal on Wednesday failed to reveal any
Order argument of real cogency against
Debate. the necessity for rationing the coal
supply, or against the manner in
which it is proposed to carry out that step. The
position, as explained by the President of the
Board of Trade, is that the output has declined
from 287,500,000 tons in 1913 to an estimated total
of 236,000,000 tons in the present year, a drop of
51| million tons. This deficiency is more than
amply accounted for by the withdrawal of some
400,000 men from the mines for military service,
which number would correspond to a decrease of
80 million tons, if one took the output per man
as only 200 tons per annum, whereas Sir Albert
Stanley was able to make the announcement that
the tonnage per man shows a net increase, during
the above period, from 235 tons to 247 tons. Apart
from the total shortage of output, which is 22^ million
tons on the year, a burden of at least 8 million tons
of coal was placed upon this country, to meet the
needs of France, arising through the German advance
in the northern French coal mining district; and,
altogether, the demand for our Allies and neutral
countries is 13 million tons greater this year than
last.

To meet this deficit, the authorities have calcu-
lated on being able to obtain an additional 10 million
tons from the coal-exporting districts and a further
3J million tons from the return of about 25,000
pre-war miners from the Army, supplemented by
the usual influx of boys into the industry. These
quantities, with approximately 7 million tons in
stock at the pits and at consumers’ depots, would
reduce the deficit to 15 million tons, to be made
good, through the rationing system, to the extent of
8 million tons in household consumption and 7 million
tons of industrial coal. So far as domestic coal is
concerned, every care seems to have been taken, in
drafting the Order, to minimise the inevitable incon-
venience of such a measure, especially in regard to
the smaller consumers; whilst, so far as industrial
coals are concerned, priority will be given, by the
committee appointed for that purpose, to the claims
of industries that are essential to the proper carrying
on of the war. Given the willing co-operation which
the Controller has the right to expect, in such a
national emergency as the present, from all who are
concerned in the production, distribution and con-
sumption of coal, the scheme should secure a
sufficiency of fuel to carry the country through the
winter without actual hardship. Inconvenience there
will certainly be in many cases, but this should be
met in the right spirit, remembering h’ow small it is
in comparison with that suffered by our Allies
France and Italy, and by the men at the front.

The criticisms levelled against the rationing scheme
were, as has already been intimated, not very con-
vincing. Sir J. Walton suggested the adoption of
steps to secure a more rapid transportation from the
collieries to the consumer; but it may undoubtedly
be taken for granted that the Controller is already
doing his utmost in this connection ; and as a railway
man, he is best aware of the difficulties that exist—
and how they can be lessened, if not entirely over-
come, in view of the heavy demand on the railways
for the conveyance of war material and the amount
of rolling stock that has had to be sent abroad for
military purposes.

Mr. Runciman was perhaps flogging a dead horse
in emphasising the value of coal exports for the
purpose of maintaining our exchanges, but he did
not suggest any means for increasing the export
trade in the chronic absence of sufficient tonnage;
nor is it quite clear how his proposal to insist on
neutrals taking 50 per cent, of small coal could be
carried out if, at the same time, we insisted on the