Charcoal As Fuel For Motor Vehicles

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19397, 7 August 1937, Page 9

Charcoal As Fuel For Motor Vehicles

PHANGES in motor truck fuels—a method by which charcoal replaces gasoline and fuel oils —were demonstrated at the Canadian chemical convention by Mr. J. H. Jenkins, of the Dominion Government forest products laboratory in Vancouver. Using a sample motor as a model, he illustrated the process which drives a truck at a cost of Is per ton per mile, as compared with 2s 4d per ton per mile for the same truck with ordinary gasoline. Relatively Cheap The process, which was developed ■i: Dominion Government laboratories, depends on the discovery that pro-ducer-gas, which is a mixture of hydrogen and carbon monoxide, can be manufactured cheaply by passing steam through burning carbon. The carbon may be in the form of coal, wood or charcoal. “So far as British Columbia is concerned, it is considered that there is a promising field for producer-ga: equipment for use in stationary plants and in motor trucks," Mr. Jenkins said. "This is especially true in districts where suitable wood —preferably alder, Douglas fir, pine and cottonwood—is plentiful." The fact that gasoline in outlying districts costs 50 to (50 per cent more than in cities inspired Canadian scientists to investigate the possibilities of producer-gas experiments originally made by European chemists, he, said. Outlying Districts “While there is no immediate possibility of replacing gasoline by producer-gas for the bulk of Canadian auto traffic, tiie adoption of producer gas equipment in mines and truck engines in outlying districts, where transportation difficulties are great and the cost of gasoline is high, is probable," he thought. The speaker stated that, many fuels have been successfully used, according to reports from European countries, including bituminous and anthracite coals, wood and charcoal. He said lie considered charcoal the ideal base because it was free of tarry compounds. Two Reactions Production of producer-gas in stationary and truck motors depends on two separate yet simultaneous chemical reactions. The passage of oxygen in tho air through the bottom of a bed of burning carbon onuses tho formation of carbon dioxide. This gas, rising through (lie heated fuel bed, absorbs carbon, and is transformed into carbon monoxide—a deadly poisonous Iml highly inflammable gas. If, at the same time, steam is passed through the blazing fuel, the production of carbon monoxide is facilitated, and, in addition, the steam is reduced to hydrogen and oxygen. The resulting mixture, composed of hydrogen, carbon monoxide, methane and a number of other gases, is a highly-eombustible blond. It operates in the motor in the same way that gasolene vapour does in an ordinary automobile.