The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1869-08-11
~, .Ceal supply nos exhaa.tlble.

The. CoaI supply mot IhexhausthDles
ccrresuondent of the New York Pos, who
has recently visited the coal mines of Pennsyl-
yania, presents some novel SUGGESTION upon
the subject Of the coal supply which win be
read with interest:
At present, on an average of the whole coal
districts, less than twelve feet in Thickness of
good coal are found and mined. Small seams
are disregarded; impurities, such as slate, dust
and rock and imperfectly formed coal are re-
Jected; large amounts are left in the mines to
support the root; and from even q good vein
the operator is doing well who obtains from
an acre thousand tons of good coal for the
market, for each foot OF his best vein in thick
ness. But although the amount now produced
IS much less, it is thought possible by experts
to obtain, with economy, an average of hiteen
thousand tons to the acre of despoiled LANDS
before abandoning them. Should the yield be
thus improved, the present supply OF sixteen
millions of tons will utterly destroy a little
more than a thousand acres of coal lands each
year But if the consumption continues to in
crease as now, at the rate OF six per cent. per
anpum. it will reach thirty millions OF tons IN
the year 1880; and all the authorities, both
here and in the southern districts, agree that
the production cannot exceed, ii il can ever
reach, that amount. c s
The limits of production are obvious here
upon the ground. A shaft with breakers, 10.
Gated and furnished in the best manner, and
capable of raising hundred thousand tons =
year, involves an expenditure of from 100000
to S300O00 before coal is produced. To repay
this, some profit must be made on very large
number of tons of coal; and considerable
area of land must be reserved, therefore, for
each shaft. If the shafts were too near to-
works were paid for. Taking into account
these and other important limitations of the
practical capacity Of the mining districts, it is
certain that nothing but a large and permanent
rise in the price of coal could lead to produc-
ton greater than thirty millions of tons; de-
struction that is, of at least two thousand acres
of the choicest coal lands every year.
At this rate of consumption it will be seen
| that the anthracite coal fields would be practi-
cally exhausted certainly before the middle of
| the next century. Those who have studied the
| subject most carefully are the officers of the
great corporations whose business is to work
and transport the coal; and some of these. at
least, believe that my very rough estimate is
too large, and that all this fruitful region will
| be robbed of its wealth, and left desolation,
| within fifty years from now. AS yet there is
certainly nothing that promises to support even
| such population as is now here, after the coal
and iron are taken out of tina hills. But civil
ization is fertile of resources, and the industry
| that now robs the earth of its primeval stores
of force, may find still more productive appli-
cations when these fail. And perhaps science
has in store for us some cheaper and better fuel
than these black rocks, whose work is to bridge
over the brief interval between the failure OF
our forests and the invention of some far short
er way Of obtaining heat than by laboriously
carrying it, latent In huge. black dirty masses,
over one hundred miles of rails.
But, SO far as We now know, the demand for
coal promises within ten or twelve years to
exceed the possible supply of anthracite. The
demand for workable coal lands is already hard
to I'LL; and at the present rate OF transfers. the
time will be still shorter within which the mass
of the beds of anthracite will be owned or held
! on long leases by asmall number of corpora
tons. Already this is the case in the Wyom-
ing fields, and the Schuylkill region shows
| signs of the same tendency. Indeed, capital
| in large masses works in this business, with SO
much greater economy than in smaller amounts
| that the aggregation of the property is public
benefit, so long as it does not become monop-
olys The owpers of coal landssif few in num-
| coal in the mine; but this would be successful
~ resisted for some years to come, by the great
/ transportationcom companies Of this district, which
| themselves own many of the finest tracts for
| mining. AT present. whatever may make coal
Land containing fifteen thousand tons Of east
| " accessible coal on every acre, are sold at
from $500 to $500 an acre, or at the rate of rom
two to three cents per ton for the coal they will
send to market, Leases are rarely higher than
| twenty cents a ton for the coal actually raised
| in this valley and hardly ever exceed thirty
| five cents a ton anywhere, even when the works
| belong to the owner Of the land.e
| This state of affairs many not continue many
years; but when it is considered that an aver
age rise of five cents ton in the value Of coal
~ rich, and transcend the widest dreams of
most of them, doubling the value of their prop
erty, it will be seen That the public has nothing
70 fear just now from any monopoly Of lands.
The cost of coal is the cost OF mining, prepar-
ing, transporting and distributing it; and It is
in these services alone that the spirit Of mo-
nopoly has found its place, and is now to be
| feared.