The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1911-02-10
IN. D. Ignite a New
Source Of Power
Billions Of Tons Of Ignite Previously thought too Poor for
Commercial Use Are Made Easily Available More
Valuable Than Harbor Goals

Guy Elliott Mitchell, in the Novem-
| Der issue Of The National Geographic
Magazine, says: Ignite is low
grade of coal, the lowest and poorest
in heat units, and only a, step re-
moved from peat and wood. The gov
eminent coal biologists estimate that
the deposits of this fuel in the United
States exclusive of Alaska aggregate
TAO billion tons Gao, 900, 900, 00O), Of
which fully one-third belongs to the
public lands.
A few years ago it was not consid-
cred important whether there was
much or little of this coal. It was
! good enough, perhaps, for the farm
ers to dig out few tons and burn in
their homes throughout the Great
Plains region, where 1t is found; but
TIT contained too few heat-units and
too much moisture to generate steam
under boiler, SO it was looked up
on as of no Industrial Importance
whatever.
Moreover, 1t would not bear trans
portation well, since 1t air-slacked and
crumbled. A. large part of the waving
wheat fields of North Dakota were
known to be underlain with Ignite,
but it was too young geologically, too
| poor in fixed carbon, to be of any great
material use to the state or the nation.
/ Subjected to volcanic or other great
1 pressures, or aged a couple of million
years, 1t might become a second Po-
cahontas coal and attain great value
commercially.
But the value Of a thing Is often a
mere matter of knowledge concerning
it. The st. Louis Worlds fair came
along, an exposition of the products
Of the great territory acquired from
Napoleon, and it was fitting that as a
result the lignites of the Dakotas and
Montana, parts of that wise purchase
should be demonstrated to have an
incalculable potential value.
Ignite Rivals Our Best Goals.
The present director of the new
bureau of mines, DR.. Joseph A. Holmes
suggested the establishment of gov
eminent fuel-testing plant at the st
Louis exposition, under the geological
survey and one of the most important
and far-reaching discoveries of the
tests was that Ignite, the useless, the
despised, would do more actual work
turn more wheels Of industry ton fol
ton, If burned in a gas producer, thar
the highest grade, highest priced
Pennsylvania or West Virginia Goa
fed into the best steam engines In
existence.
The results of these tests are among
the most remarkable of any age re-
plete in wonders Of discovery and in
vention. North Dakotans need not
wait two million years nor pay for 6
volcanic CONFUSION to transform then
Ignite into coal; the Ignite today has
an industrial value which may YET
turn many billowy grain fields int
thriving manufacturing centers.
Plainly stated, these geological sur
vey fuel tests showed that when Goa
Is made into produced-gas and thsl
used in a gas engine It has from tWt
to three times the efficiency or driv'
ing power that it has when burned
under a gas boiler n the ordinary way
The high grade Goals, too, were founf
to possess a greater efficiency wher
used in a gas engine, but the specta-
cuIar features of the experiments wa;
that vast stores of the Ignite, which
are entirely useless for steaming pur-
poses and had previously been con-
sidered practically worthless, can bt
most successfully in the gas producer
Remarkable Work Of the Gas Engine
Prof Robert H. Fernald, late In
charge of the producer gas tests of the
geological survey, made an estimate
of the cost and operation OF a ga
engine in comparison with that OF
steam engine of the same horse power
and also of two large engines, gal
; and steam, of the same horse power
The figures are impressive PROBES
} sor Fernald gives the cost Of a co.
s horse power gas plant at $4,000 AM
the steam plant at $4,000, $4,000 Il
favor the steam plant. Operating bot
, plants 30 days, "a hours a day, tn
total cost for coal in the gas plan
would be. $3.50; in the steam plant
$3.50.
: Cost of Construction.
In large plant, however, OF 500
J horse power, he found no dlnerence II
cost between steam and gas plants
But running these two plants contlnu
ously for one year, the gas plant Woul'
require but $1,000 tons of coal, Whlcl
, at say $3.50 ton, would be $4,000
, while the steam plant would consum
: $4,000 tons of coal at a cost of Sl05,
, COO. The total operating expense an
fixed charges of the 5000 horse powe
gas producer plant are given at Sal,
775. while those of the 5000 horse
! power steam plant would cost $21s,53
AN annual saving of $77,5SO.
In Offering the estimates, Professo
Fernald declares that he has made tn
; best possible showing for the steam
I engine. while that of the producer ga
4 plant is but a fair figure. In con
: clusion. he adds: II believe that tn
producer gas plant can better the fie
IRE given, but I doubt very mucl
; whether the steam plant figure ca
be excelled, even IL 1t can be reached.
Surely such savings of cost as thes
rnust appeal to the big manufacturer
That they do is shown by the fac
that certain types Of steam engine
: exhibited at the st. Louis fair as tn
! very acme of steam engine construc
: ton have since then been thrown Int
2 the iunk-heap and gas produce
plants substituted.
Producer Gas We. Steam Plants.
: In one of Professor Fernald's re
Q ports large number of most inter
{, esting comparisons were given, snow
(. ing the relative efficiency or stear
8 and gas plants in converting varlou
u grades OF coal into electrical energy
: Thus. of an Illinois coal from Spring
e field. it required SGT pounds TO de
: velop horsepower In the steaI
plant as against only 179 pounds !
the gas plant. OF an Indiana (Terr
IIautel coal, 1t required 4.52 pound
r in the steam plant against l.61 pound