Читать книгу Description of the Process of Manufacturing Coal Gas. For the Lighting of Streets Houses, and Public Buildings онлайн

23 страница из 52

ssss1 A Statement of the advantages to be derived from coal gas.—p. 42.

It remains further to be observed that the coal, by yielding gas and other products, namely, tar, pitch, and ammoniacal liquor, is not entirely lost. It produces, besides light, an excellent fuel, namely, coke; and as a manufactory, or workshop, generally requires heating as well as lighting, there is a gain both ways. The manufacturer, by distilling his coal instead of burning it as it comes from the pit, saves his candles and improves his fuel. One effort at the outset in erecting a gas apparatus, will reduce his annual disbursement for those two articles of prime necessity, much in the same manner, though in a greater degree, as the farmer gains by building a thrashing machine and laying aside the use of the flail.

The coal is so far from being reduced in consequence of the gas-light process, to an useless mass, that in many places immense quantities are reduced to the state of coke for the purpose of rendering the coal a better fuel than it was in its natural state; for coke gives a strong and lasting heat. It is equally valuable for kitchen and parlour fires, and still more as a necessary requisite in some important branches of manufacture, so that in whatever quantity coke may be produced, it can never want a good market. The demand for coke in this capital, since the establishment of the gas-light works, has prodigiously increased. Numerous taverns, offices, and public establishments, which heretofore burnt coal, now use coke to the total exclusion of coal; and in almost every manufactory, which requires both extensive lighting and heating, gas and coke are now the means jointly employed. A coke fire emits a very uniform and intense heat; it produces no sparks, and burns free from soot and smoke; it requires no trouble in managing, and to those who have the misfortune of being plagued with a smoaky chimney, affords the only certain cure.