The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-08-22
UTILIZING WASTE COAL DUST.

Economical Fuel
 Among the several branches of Ger
 man industry which deserve the atten-
 tion of Americans by reason of their
 economy, their recovery or utilization of
 some raw material which exists unused
 in our country, or because they involve
 the most intelligent application of sci-
 entific knowledge to technical processes,
 may be reckoned the manufacture of
 briquets from brown coal, peat and the dust and waste of coal mines. As has
 been stated in previous reports Of this
 series, briquets form the principal do-
 mestic fuel of Berlin and other cities
 and districts in Germany; they are used | for locomotive and other steam firing,
 and are employed for heating in vari-
 ous processes of manufacture. For all
 these uses, they have three tangible ad-
 vantages: They are clean and conven-
 tent to handle; they light easily and l quickly, and burn with clear, intense l flame; they make practically no smoke,
 and are, withal, the cheapest form of
 fuel for most purposes.
 Like most other impotant German in-
 dustries, the briquet manufacture is
 controlled by a syndicate which includes
 among it's members tflirty-one firms
 and companies, or more than, nine tenths of all the producers in this coun-
 try, and regulates the output and prices
 for each year. From the official report of the syndicate for 1901, which has re- | gently appeared, it is learned that the
 total output during last year was 1,566,- | 385 tons to which is to be added the product of makers outside the syndi-
 cate, consumed at works, small retail
 sales, etc., making grand total of l. | 643,416 tons.
 | The average selling price in large l quantities was 1888 marks ($3.16) per I ton, against 1927 marks ($2,92) for the
 year previous, so that, notwithstanding
 the general relaxation of industrial &C., tivity and the diminished pressure upon
 the coal, supply, the ruling price was l the highest that had been realized since
 1891. Of the 1,5s63S5 tons sold by the syndicate last year, 749,208 tons were
 taken by the German railways, 124,3S0
 tons were cold to retailers, 497, ,136 tons
 were sold to factories and works of va
 rious kinds, and 149,0s9 tons, or 9.S per cent, were used by German merchant
 steamers and the navy or exported to the German colonies or neighboring I European countries.
 | The syndicate produces to large ex- | tent briquets made from coal screen | ings, which require matrix or binder of some plastic, infiamnable material,
 and for this purpose. 116956 tons of
 mineral pitch, were used, which cost on
 an average about $10.25 per ton.
 It need hardly be said that the gene 1 ral use of briquets for domestic fuel in
 large, densely built city, as we'll as for generating steam in a number of cleo I tric generating plants and factories, must have decided and beneficial in- 1 f1uence in reducing the smoke, which in
 most American cities has become a per- sistent and oppressive nuisance. Ber- ! lin, although busy manufacturing city, ranks as one of the cleanest and l best kept in Europe. One of the first things usually noticed by American and English travellers visiting the German capital for the first time is the absence l of that cloud of dusty smoke that over l hangs so many towns and cities in our country. The reason for this lies in three facts: The predonderant use of coke and briquets, which are practical | ly smokeless; the skilful, scientific con- struction of boiler furnaces and chin1- ! neys, and, finally the high standard of skill that is taught and enforced among c .+o f,,r yr,ifh for steam and manufacturing purposes. It Is not every strapping laborer who can shovel coal who Is permitted to stoke a boiler furnace in this country. Before he can assume such a charge, he | must be taught the theory and practice of economical, scientific firing, by which the coal is distributed in such manner and quantity over the grate surface as to secure the most perfect combination of its volatile elements. The Silesian cial used here in most large steam plants and factories is rich in bitumen, and would rank below
 many of the bituminous coals of the United States, and yet the long, dense, trailing clouds of snake from mill and factory chimneys which are so familiar a sight in many American cities are
 rarely seen in this section of Germany. where the indiscriminate shoveling of
 raw bituminous coal into the steam and
 other furnaces is considered an ignorant
 and wasteful proceeding.
 Coke-makipg in retort ovens, by
 which every element is saved and bitu-
 minous coal converted into smokeless coke and gas, Is another important fac tor in German fuel economy and abate-
 ment of the smoke nuisance. If Amer ican municipalities beyond the economic range of anthracite are ever emancipa-
 ted from their present vassalage to the
 smoke incubus, it will be through the
 enforced use of one or more of three
 forms of prepared fuel, namely, coke and fuel gas made in closed ovens from bituninous coal, and briquets made from Ignite, peat and other inferior materials, by processes which have been invented, tested and proved to be efficient by the older and more econom- oo,,p r; of II Pa-