GAS FOR TRANSPORT

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 73, 19 December 1919, Page 7

GAS FOR TRANSPORT

• — I LORD MOULTON'S FORECAST,. j ■Lord Moullon, in Ma address as profiidcnt of the British Commercial Gas Association in London in October, allud- , ed to tho , war, winch item hastened tne development of tho industry, and said that it was recognised that tho industry ; should hnvo a high standard of duty in the way of rendering a maximum publio ■ service. It ihad no competition; that was , necessary in order to guard agmnst use- ! loss waste of capital. That, liowover, ,■ inado it incumbent on those who prac- •] tised the industry to take a higli.etaii. dard of their duty, and of developing it ; - to the utmost. . The thin? that was necessary after tho war. when the nation was discovered tn . be lying under a crushing burden of ; debt with its people havinglost the , steady habit of monotonous and contimi- ■ ons work, on which all successful production must l>o based, was nod the re- ' construction of those great whfices that , were sketched out by hopeful'theorists, ; but tilie relaying of the foundations of ( threatened with hot schemes ; for iiho development of electricity on. < lines utterly slrnngo to them, from a \ scnle of monopoly features which, never iiad commended themselves to tno linglisli people. Tho development of doc-1 trioity delighted him- But in till those schemes the eyes of tho would-be reformer were fixed on somo liopnd-for result and Ihev never studied what they could 'lo for the public. They we.ro not lush- : hod in treating electricitj- liosliloly m nnv way. Id had put a standard bufore them in tho way of distribution of mo- : live power and of light wihich it would take all the energies of thoso in tho gas industry to equal. Bui) they had to , make tho public realise that they possess- j ed unrivalled power of distributing heat; so that it could bo used economically for domestic purposes. At tho present moment, wihon it was necessary, to conserve the coal eupply, electricity would not be , looked to as a solution of tho difliculty;. but the nso of gas in all its forms was the most potent weapon at their command. Mechanical traction had seized tho whole of the world, but nowhoro was ' its grip so strong as in England! at pro-. sent, and ho was nfrnid Wio position would bo the eame in the future, rhero was a practically limitless supply of that: ■ which, unless tho price of petrol fell, could give effectively tho same powernamely, riw. It was quite possiblo that • (ho llesible niotor-oninibiis would develop; larscly, and, if so. unless tho prico of petrol" kept low, they would have to come to tlio nuied and useful gas indus-: try for tho solution of mechanical transport. At last tho despised coke wus com- , ing into its kingdom. Tho rmblio were realising that it was only , ighWiiiico of i tho proper way of bringing out its qualities and using its full efficiency that, Kiado it a kind of Cinderella emonj fuels.