PETROL FROM COAL.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVII, Issue 201, 9 August 1927, Page 7

PETROL FROM COAL.

RESEARCH IN CANTERBURY. DISCQVERY BY ACCIDENT.. Christchurch, Aug. 5. A development that promises to have very great commercial significance, the obtaining of petrol distillate from the waste part of an ordinary Canterbury brown coal, has resulted Cromal research which is being conducted at Canterbury University College. Mr W. G. Hughson, M.Ss., is at present carrying out a postgraduate investigation at the college into the possibilities of smokeless fuel. During this work a greenish distillate, obtained from some brown Malfern coal, was collected, and its inflammable properties were made known to a student when he placed it too near an open flame and was badly burned by its sudden combustion. The distillate was then subjected to certain tests, which have convinced Mr Hughson that some form of petrol has emanated from the useless part of a brown coal. Experiments of a smiliar nature, carried out on various other sorts of coal from all parts of New Zealand, have failed to produce the same dis tillate. Samples have been sent to countries where similar work is m progress.