The Kennewick courier-reporter. [volume] (Kennewick, Wash.) 1939-1949, 1941-01-02
Perfects New
Fuel Formula
ChemistD evelopsSynthetie
Power to Turn Wheel,
Of Industry.

PITTSBURGH.-In a dimly liph,.
ed laboratory Of Carnegie institute
a chemist is developing synthetic
power to turn the wheels Of industrp
when natures coal and oil resource,
have been exhausted
The chemist. DR. Ernst Berl, fIed
from Germany in 1882 He began
his studies Of the formation OF coal
and oil deposits l3 years ago.
DR.. Berl now claims to hays
solved the process by which nature
produced and stored away fuel "a.
serves. In his laboratory he is pre-.
pared to change a handkerchief into
high-grade coal, molasses into anti.
knock gasolh '.
Through the processes he has de.
veloped, DR.. Berl said, the way /,
open to manufacture fuel from com.
mon carbohydrates. such as cellu.
lose and sugars Of corn, Seaweed
algae, molasses and cotton. He be.
lieves some day man can cease %
draw upon dwindling oil supplies
and turn to the farmers products
for fabrication and power.
While present coal resour. Q may
last 5000 years, DR.. Berl said, this
nations supply Of easy 70 get" OF
may be exhausted in so years.
"our children will have to do
something with this problem" he
said. Lets be extremely careful
Of our resources; let's be liberal
with our farm products.
RepIOtted Natures Processes.
DR.. Berrs researches started q
Germany when he abandoned The
accepted theory that natural coal
and oil were a derivative OF ngnIn,
or Ignite, and set out TO replot the
processes Of nature.
His research, he said, showed coal
and oil were derivatives Of cellulose,
rather than lignin, and that the for
nation Of asphalt was an informed.
ate step in the process, rather than
a product Of oil.
With this mystery solved, DR.. Berl
began TO reproduce the process IN
his test tubes. The result was syn.
thetic coal and oil, which, DR.. Berl
stated, have the same properties as
the natural materials.
Mature had, let us say, zoe, 100000
years to produce these materials"
the scientist, now a naturalized cid.
zen, said. with higher tempera.
lures and higher pressure, now we
can produce them in an hour" HE
method, he added, is VERY easy"
Carbohydrates Used.
Carbohydrates, such as produced
in vegetation, are combined with
limestone, or dolomite, and heated
under pressure until converted into
a dark tarlike substance, which Dr..
Berl has named ''proto-product"
Under further internal combustion,
the substance is converted into as,
phalt.
The asphalt, in turn, is converted
into coal and oil by cracking" or
hydrogenization. The final product
can be changed from coal to oil BY
varying the amount Of limestone
used.
The cost of producing gasoline
from common carbohydrates, &C
cording to DR.. Berl, would be four
times the cost of distilling 1t from
natural oil at the present time. Fur
Their Improvement Of the process
will reduce the ratio to about three
to one, he said.
Production of gasoline by the new
method, however, would be cheaper
than by the hydrogenization OF coal
as is being done in Germany at the
present time, and costs approx
mately the same as distillation from
oil-bearing shale. The abundance o.
carbohydrates available for CONVEX
sion into oil by the new method
however, gives il an advantage Over