Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1913-06-17
New Schemes for
Harvesting Nature.

| In a few centuries the worlds coal
mines Will he exhausted. Whence shall
we derive the energy to turn the
wheels of industry? BY Harvesting
nature. is the answer. Long before we
took stock of our fuel supply and found
that we must husband what little we
have left, scientific dreamers wondered
whether natural forces could not in
some way be utilized. To be sure the
potential energy stored up i'm every
'oombustihle is a natural force; how
ever artificial our engines may seem,
their power is nevertheless ultimately
obtained from the sun. But that pow
Ter is released and applied only by com
plicated and cumbrous mechanism that
wastes many times more energy that it
delivers. Why should it not be possible
to tap the free energy of space. the
energy with which the sun, for exam
pie, necessarily bombards us? Can not
some engine be devised to transform
and make available the apparently in
exhaustible supply of energy liberated
by every atom of radium? To answer
questions such as these with anything
like satisfaction is impossible. Yet they
are discussed by the most distinguish
ed physicians of the day, and therefore
they acquire q. dignity with which they
might not otherwise be invested.
The only natural source of free ener-
sy that engineers have thus far sue
|eessfu'ly utilized is water power. How
they have gone to work is so old sto-
ry that it need not be retold here.
Their task was simple. The crudest
kind of baded wheel ground corn CEN
turtles ago The great turbines of Nj
agara Falls are merely improvements
upon It.
A waterfall is a readymade solar
engine, the only commercial solar en-
gine that man has succeeded in utilz-
ing. No machine has ever been de-
signed or ever will be designed that
will surpass the waterfall in efficiency.
The sun pumps the water of ocean.
lake and river on mountain tops, and
the force of gravity drops. the wafer
again to its original lesel. The cycle
is endless. Because there are no
valves. no shafts, no connecting rods,
no thermal losses, the efficiency is one
hundred per cent. 1t has been calcu-
lated that the total energy of these at
mospheric deposits amounts to 10000
900 horse power With the advent of
electricity and its Introduction Into
industry part at least of this energy is
being used-the sole example of the
successful use of natures free energy
But why not go directly to the sun?
its radiation has been measured and
expressed in engineering units. In his
Royal Institution lectures of 1911 Sir j.
J. Thomson stated that. shining from
a clear sky, the sun sends to the earth
energy at the rate of 1000 horse power
an acre. Moreover, as the temperature
of the sun is at least 5000 deg. Cent
this energy must arrive in a highly IA
vora bic condition; theoretically 1t
ought to be almost wholly convertible
into mechanical work. No wonder that
the construction of commercial solar
engine has been one of the most fas-
einating problems that ever engaged
the attention of inventors.
Up to within recent years the most
leila borate experiments on record were
those of Captain John Ericsson. de-
|signer of the famous Monitor" On a
rainless strip 5000 miles long and one
mile wide, extending almost continue
IousIy from Africa into Asia and from
South America into the United States,
solar heat enough is wasted he figured,
10 drive 22s.S00 900 solar engines of 100
horse power each nine hours a day
Since Ericsson's day other attempts
have been made along different lines.
Readers are familiar with the propo-
sails of Mr.. Frank Shuman. Prof. Regi-
Maid Fessenden and Messrs. Willsie
and J. Boyle. Jr. Because their appar-
atus has been described in these col
Iumns at sufficient length it is unneces-
sary to dwell upon 1t again. In all
these three solar power plants, the
hot box" of de Saussure, Langley and
other pioneer solar physicists is en-
ployed. In other words, a film of wa
ter is heated in a glass-covered trough
THE heat impounded by the trough is
sufficient to raise the water to a boil
| ing point, or very near it. Mr.. Shu-
man has designed a low-presSurc en-
CINE in which this hot water is flashed
into steam. Messrs. Willsie and Boyle
employ their hot water to vaporize q
liquid. which has boiling point lower
| than that of the water. a liquid such
as sulphur dioXide. The vapors which
are given off from the sulphur dioxide
at a pressure of 215 pounds to tbs
square inch. drive a specially designed
engine and are then returned to bt
fused over again The water. which
has given up it's heat to the sulphur
dfoxide, is sent through the hot-bo,
again to absorb more heat from tht
| sun.
Since the sun does not shine by nigh
even in the desert of Sahara, n storage
system must be devised-a piece of ap
paratus that can be charged with ex
cess power and tapped at will in sun
| less periods. Compressed air tanks
storage batteries charged by dynamo
! driven by the solar engine, waite
pumped into reservoir by a sofa
| pump and used later to drive a waite
| wheel, have all been proposed. Messr
| WIisie and Boyle store their hot wa
| ter IN well-insulated tank, so that /
retains it's heat over night and is al
ways hot enough to vaporize sulphur
doxide. Mr. Shuman has also design
| ed an insulated tank or boiler FOL
| stf.ripp hot water