COAL WASTAGE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 206, 1 September 1936, Page 5

COAL WASTAGE.

BAD MINING METHODS. Js> MINISTER EXPRESSES ALARM. NEW AVENUES NEEDED. (By Telegraph.—Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, tliis day. "The unnecessary wastage of eoal, anj irreplaceable national asset, lias always j given me the greatest concern," stated) the Minister of Mines, the Hon. P. C. j Webb, in tlie Mines Statement tabled in the House of Representatives to-day. Wastage, the Minister stated, occurred as the result of bad mining methods, mine fires and the dumping of slack. Tlie officers of his Department had done much in the past to eliminate the first two sources of waste, and they would have his strongest support in striving for further improvement. In his statement he dealt with the need for seeking new avenues of coal utilisation. There were 202 eoal mines operating in the Dominion in 1935, the Minister stated, 90 being on freehold property and the remainder on Crown lands. The production of coal in 1935 amounted to 2,115,184 tons, an increase of 2.0 per cent on the figure for 1934. Since 1933 a recovery of over i(i per cent had taken place. The quantity of coal imported into New Zealand had decreased during the year to 97,398 tons, the smallest quantity imported in any one year since 1871. Since taking office the Minister had done his utmost to induce gas companies to increase their consumption of local coal. "Every ton of coal properly utilised will develop as much energy as one thousand men at heavy labour for one day," stated the Minister in dealing with wastage problems. "Irrespective of whether it is in the form of slac or not every ton of coal contains innumerable constituents of the greatest value to the human race. From one product only of the carbonisation of coal —namely, coal tar —over 2000 derivatives are obtainable, and with the advance of science coal as the course of many of the requirements. of modern civilisation must come moae and more into its own. "There is, undoubtedly, much scope for the adoption of better methods of mining in many mines on freehold lands. Although a coal seam may be situated on private property it is still a community asset, and I cannot admit that private ownership qoiifers upon the owner a franchise to waste a portion of that asset. The other form of waste, the dumping of slack, is an exceedingly serious problem in some localities, . notably the Waikato district, where tlie slack quickly ignites after being dumped, and is thus destroyed. In the.past few years in one district alone we have been calmly dumping 100,000 tons of slack each year, and, apart from the loss of the coal itself, it lias cost thousands of pounds per annum to commit the sin. This rate of wastage is equivalent in energy to the continuous labour of over 300,000 men. As Minister of Mines, I say emphatically that this state of affairs must cease."