Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-04-08
LOWER GASOLINE
PRICES COMING
De. ,Rittman Says Synthetic
Process Will Make Five
Times More Available


Synthetic gasoline will catch up
with the demand in the next six
months. You can look for higher
prices, but in the course of a year or
able supply of gasoline. We will catch
up with the demand.
There is no cause for anxiety over.
the price of gasoline" says l.. ii. Hag
erling, Hudson distributor in this ter
ritory, who, in substantiation of this
comforting assurance. cites the recent
talk OF DIR. Rittman, government expert,
before the Dayton Engineers Club.
Or. Rittman," says Mr.. Hagerling,
~ the man who announced a few
months ago the discovery of a new
oil. Being in the employ of the gov
ernment he devoted years of research
work to the gasoline subject and his
views at Dayton have the stamp of
authority. DIR. Rittman's talk was as
follows:
Expenditures of gasoline are great
er to-day than ever before. One thing
that has knocked the bottom out of
the gasoline market is the falling off
OF Oklahoma crude oil. Less than a
year ago, Gushing field produced 300.
600 barrels of crude oil, which ana
lyzed from 20 per cent to 80 per cent
OF gasoline, in other words, 10000 bar
ply has fallen OFF until it is below one
thind that amount.
That means that despite this dis
covery, which was brought out eight
by expenditures exceeding SS,0O000O,
and is now being installed in ten ad-
dltlonal plants, with twenty more want
ing IT, but we simply cannot take care
OF them - it means that despite this
progress we cannot cope with the prob
lem, and IL will be some time before
curve.
No two crude oils are the same. As
matter of fact, two wells in the same
oilHeld are different and one will con-
-
average gasoline content of petroleums
IN America is below IL per cent. BY
breaking processes we can bring that
up to 60 per cent; in other words, five
times what ii was.
The term gasoline means nothing 1t
is a commercial term which originally
meant those constituents which in ma
tural distillation boiled off below $50
degrees Centigrade That temperature
has been successfully raised until it is
now about 115, and is going progress
sively higher. That means that where
a Pennsylvania oil ten years ago pro-
duced, say 10 per cent gasoline and
that same oil il anything. has deteri-
GRATED; that is they are digging deep
er in the bowels Of the earth - that
same grade to-day is producing 20 per
cent
The heat containing oils. exempIi-
ned by the Oklahoma oils, are also very
variable for gasoline production. Some
OF the oils as found in Texas, in the
Hemble field, which has been opened
up recently and is producing 100, 900
barrels per day, contains practically no
gasoline but contains kerosene to the
extent of about 40 pei, cent. Califor-
MIA oils and Mexican oils contain prac-
tically no gasoline. The average con-
tanned in California oils for about
lOO0OO,OO0 gallons produced per annum.
is about 12 per cent. But we can pro-
duce gasoline from these oils by the
cracking process
Now. then can we look forward to
the solution of this problem by ma
alcohol
bustibles? That is not probable for a
long time to come. Purely as a matter
Of cost alcohol does not become fac
tor as a motor fuel until gasoline
passes forty cents per gallon
IF you hgure the number of acres
required for raising the corn and po-
nal combustion engines, you will find
that we would use good big part of
the United States to do it,
There are to-day two and a half
million automobiles or say. two and a
quarter. Figuring conservatively, es-
timated 20 horsepower each, we have
combined horsepower of all the steam
motives in America is less than 80 per
cent. of that.
I'VE do not ordinarily realize that
you figure 500 gallons per machine per
annum. There is considerably more
than billion gallons right there. Then,
our rough estimate is that for other
purposes, including export, we use so
ternal combustion engines.
Another solution that is suggested
is the use of electricity. But electricity
as a means of carrying forward our
automobiles is not the thing at present,
purely as a matter of cost. So we
must wipe out this alcohol and other
combustibles.
THE mechanical engineer has done
splendid things in his line; namely, to
construct engines to use heavier fuels.
The chemical engineer method of solv-
[ n would n
of these kerosenes, gas oils and other
materials. Now, how far is this re-
alty to-day? ! will answer by saying
that it is much more of reality than
any of us realize. This very day there
are 100000 automobiles in the country
that run on cracked gasoline = gaso-
line made from other materials, such
as kerosene. gas oil. ETC..
Now, how much gasoline can we
hope to get by this method? On those
Eastern crudes we should get from 20
per cent. to so per cent. of the crude
oil. On crude such as the Mexican, we
should get 40 per cent. to 90 per cent.
So you see, we can hope to solve this
gasoline problem by various cracking
processes / do not wish to limit my
self to the Bureau of Mines processes.
j am trying to speak broadly. There
are hundreds OF men working on this
problem, hundreds of intelligent men,
and that means only one thing-that
there is going to be variety of solu-
| tions and processes.
out a thousand barrels of gasoline a
day, would make just enough to take
care of 10000 automobiles, which is
only FIVE days supply, remember a
big plant, so it seems. But merely to
make up the deficit in gasoline pro-
duction which has occurred since last
July in Oklahoma field alone, we will
have to build fifty of those plants in
stead of our present ten, and we are
going to be some time catching up with
it. But once these operations come to
be standardized they will no longer
engage the attention of those of us
who have worked them out and who
are familiar with them.
But the people viii carry IL fur
ther than we have ever hoped to carry
1t. That is why L say that synthetic
gasoline will catch up with the demand
in the next six months. You can look
for higher prices before lower prices
but in the course of a year or so, most
certainly we will have an available
supply of gasoline. We will catch up
with the demand"