POWDERED FUEL

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XIX, Issue 30, 22 January 1929, Page 9

POWDERED FUEL

USE IN SHIPS PROFH6OY OF VICTORY OVER OIL. NEW COAL WEALTH. "The position which has almost been accepted to-day, that transport on the sea will not be coaldriven, has to be fought etrongly. When it comes down—as it mult. come down—to a tight to a finish between oil and coal as a prime mover of ships, powdered fuel must, because of ite economy, win in the end.” Lieut.-Colonel J. T, C. MooreBrnbazon, M.P., made this remark in his presidential address to the Junior Institution of Engineers recently in London. We should never again see this country prosperous (he said) if we were to rely on coal in its raw state as a basic source of all wealth.' A real advance mnst be looked for by increasing the value of the coal mined by treatment. The low temperature system of coal treatment had had an nnfortunate business atmosphere to contend with for the last twenty years, but many early pioneer works, notably wireless. had had a similar experience, but had grown into flourishing industries. Such would be the case with low temperature carbonisation of coal.

“The coal,” he continued, “is, roughly, turned into three commodities, each of which is more marketable than the original fuel—residual fuel, oil, and gas. “I use the words 'residual fuel’ for lack of a better description. This is a new fuel, and its structure is very different from coke. It is readily lit, will burn in an open fire lit by paper (not even demanding wood), and, unlike coke, will burn itself out.” WHY OIL IS USED. Referring to its potentialities for use at sea, Colonel Moore-Brabazon saids—

“The great liners do not burn oil for economic reasons, but because of the quickness of loading, the absence of trimmers, and the fact that two or three journeys more can be obtained during the year, which all tends to compensate them for the additional cost. It is well known that pulverised fuel can be pumped along pipes into bunkers, and behaves very much as oil, so that one has a fuel here which, on first investigation, would show an enormous advantage over oil firing. Unfortunately, there there is a disadvantage, which is that pulverised fuel, with its high Volatile content, is an explosive and liable to spontaneous combustion. “Here it is that what I have termed ‘residual fuel’ comes into its own. It is a non-explosive fuel, and, consequently, the future storage in large tanks of this particular fuel ’s well within sight, I dp not pretend that the technical difficulties of the 1 Be of pulverised residual fuel in large quantities are at the present moment solved, but the solution is within sight. “Such necessities as keeping the powder what is called ‘fluffed,’ or in circulation, with inert gas derived from the smoke stack, in order to stop the fuel packing and keeping it always in a fluid state, are problems for the engineer in the immediate future; but what I do want to stress more than anything is that here is an actual new field for the ronsuiuption of coal.

“It may happen in some cases,’ - he concluded, “that coal mined firm the mine is not used as coal t>t any stage, but that it be, first of all, treated by low temperature carbonisation, thus extractir.g the gas and heavy oils, and that tne residual fuel be then built up synthetically into hydrocarbons. Here is ah entirely new use for coal, such as has never been dreamt of; it is the brains and for the imagination of engineers to push these things to their natural finality. “1 do not pretend that our import bill of £40.000,000 for oil will be wiped out in a few years, but the drain upon the resources of industrial Europe, full of coal but lacking in oil, will eventually be stopped, and, consequently, in this great Cndeavoilt we find allied on our side both France and Germany, working at the same problem.”