NORTHERN ADVOCATE DAILY TUESDAY, JANUARY 31, 1928. NEW WEALTH IN COAL

Northern Advocate, 31 January 1928, Page 4

NORTHERN ADVOCATE DAILY

TUESDAY, JANUARY 31, 1928. NEW WEALTH IN COAL

Registered for transmission through the post as a newspaper.

One of the striking changes slowly taking place in the old country is the passing of the purely coal age. Many things have contributed to deprive Britain of her former 'great source of wealth and power in her coal trade. Her coal has become dearer to get. Many British mines are so deep aa to be unpayable to -work against foreign competition. The ,• coal-getting organisation underground is said to bo inferior to that of Germany and the United States. Reparations by Germany have upset Britain ? s foreign coal trade, for Geiraany has been paying France and Italy, for instance, considerably in the form of coal. Britain finds now that coal markets abroad have to be canvassed aa assiduously as other merchant markets—it is the fashion, Again, the growing use of oil as fuel on sea and ashore, and the now advance in the use of internal combustion engines instead of either oil or coal burning furnaces—teese have also interfered with the British raw export staple. The difficulties of the trade at Home have been increased by a series of most serious iridustriai irtoppages in recent years, affecting not only the coal trade, but every other industry in the country. The future of British trade and industry as seen through the struggles of the coal trade has seemed at times so depressing that the recent statement by Mr Frank Hodges on the new and brighter outlook for coal and its dependent activities is distinctly uplifting. Mr Hodges should know what be is talking about. He was formerly secretary of the British Miners’ Federation, and is now a member of the Central Electricity Board. Referring to the initiation of centralised electric power schemes for England and the Scottish Lowlands, Mr Hodges speaks of the past wasteful use of coal and the coming “new range of economic values which will spell abundant prosperity once again to our nation.” He opens up a vision of “the new' line for Britain” 'in fuel and power organisation. “The utilisation of surplus gases from high and low temperature coking plants by means of long-distance gas transmission, or alternatively the use of these gases for the production of electricity, will change fundamentally our whole national fuel economy.” Again, oil has made inroads upon the coal trade, but “we have no real cause for fear. We arc on the threshold of a ncw r era. Wo arc beyond the experimental stage in obtaining oil supplies from coal. The year 1928 will reveal real progress in this direction.” The day of the pulverised fuel furnace, using low-grade coal, the refuse from which oils and gases have been extracted, is declared to be at hand, and Mr Hodges points to the experiment new being under-

taken by a trans-Atlantic ship fitted with this new furnace. The advantage Britain still holds is that her coal is of superior quality to most others, and the best coal is still .a commodity in high demand about the world. With the new economic use of coal its price should improve, and Mr Hodges sees “new era of prosperity,” with Britain “independent of the world’s oil supply, abundant and cheap power and energy at home, and the recapturing of the bunker trade of the world.” The establishment of British industries upon national electric-power supplies is one feature of the great changes thus sketched. Hand-in-hand with this, the abolition of the wasteful use of coal, and the release of the extracted oil for commercial pSrposos, should lift an immense burden from British industries. The other side of the picture is the adapting to the changing economy of future developments in ship construction. Despite the immense advantages of the United States in the oil trade, the British Empire today maintains a share in the world’s oil-carrying trade very little short of that of the United States. The tonnage figures of oil-tankers are, respectively, 2,041,000 and 2,310,000. Since 1914 the percentage of oil-burn-ing ships in the world’s mercantile fleets has risen from 2.65 to 28.16, and of ships driven by internal combustion engines from 0.45 to 5.39. Coalburning vessels have decreased in the same period from 88.54 per cent, to 63.19. Of steamships a tonnage of only 730,000 was driven by turbine engines in 1914; today the corresponding tonnage is 9,137,675. The steam-driven

marine engine is fighting hard against the internal-combustion engine, but increase, of speed and the elimination of vibration arc still details on which the motor engines in big ships await improvement. The competition to reduce costs is producing greatly improved turbines, such as in the new Clyde steamer, -whoso engines are drive j at a steam pressure of 550 pounds to the square inch. Despite her traditional dependence on coal, Britain built the world’s first largo movor-engined passenger lingr, the Aorangi, which New Zealand is growing to know familiarly. The experimental Atlantic ship Mercer, to which Mr Hodges refers, is a vessel adapted by the American Shipping Board for burning pulverised coal, and she will run on the North Atlantic service for a sufficient period to prove the adaptability and economic value of the now fuel as compared with oil fuel. The whole question is of immense interest to the British Empire overseas as well as to the Homeland.