Gas producer

“ Natural gas occurs in very large quantities in the United States, where it is conveyed through pipes under pressure for hundreds of miles, and distributed among factories and houses for driving machinery, heating, and cooking. In England and Europe the petroleum engine and coal-gas engine have been most utilised; but of late the employment of smelting-furnace gases—formerly blown into the air and wasted—and of "producer" gas has come into great favour with manufacturers. ”

“ Great, however, as the economic results of the gas-producer have been, its inventor looked forward to still more remarkable applications of it. In 1882 he told the British Association, in his presidential address, that he thought103 “the time is not far distant when both rich and poor will largely resort to gas as the most convenient, the cleanest, and the cheapest of heating agents, and when raw coal will be seen only at the colliery or the gas-works. ”

“ A well known gas producer for small scale use is Dowson's. Steam is superheated in a coil of pipe, and blown through glowing anthracite along with air. The gas which comes off consists of 20 per cent. hydrogen, 30 per cent. carbonic oxide, 3 per cent. carbonic acid, and 47 per cent. nitrogen. It is a weak gas, but it serves for gas engines, and is used, I believe, by Thompson, of Leeds, for firing glass and pottery in a gas kiln. It is said to cost 4d. per 1,000 ft., and to be half as good as coal gas.
For furnace work, where gas is needed in large quantities, it must be made on the spot. ”

“ A. Producer Gas, Siemens Gas.—As we have seen above, this gas is made by the incomplete combustion of fuel. The materials generally employed for its production are anthracite, coke or other fuels which are not liable to cake during the operation, and thus stop the draught or otherwise disturb the process, but by special measures also bituminous coal, lignite, peat and other fuel may be utilized for gas producers. The fuel is arranged in a deep layer, generally from 4 ft. ”

“ Petroleum as a Fuel and Gas-Producer.—The use of gasolene in gas-machines is well known, and sometimes naphtha has been used to enrich coal-gas, by decomposing its vapor at a cherry-red heat, so as to produce a gas rich in heavy hydrocarbons, which is mixed with the coal-gas. Crude petroleum has also been conducted continuously into red-hot cast-iron retorts, whereby it is decomposed and rich gas formed. ”

“ Modern industry does not tie itself to any particular servant, but chooses in turn whichever, under the circumstances of a case, will serve it well at least cost. Where natural gas is to be had at a low price it holds the field. But the area thus favored is small, so that producer gas is employed on a much larger scale. We have already seen (page 461) how coal may be gasified, valuable by-products seized, and a cheap gas be piped for miles with no liability to the condensation which befalls steam, while available for heating and for motive power. ”

“ Many of those present know that I am as ready to totally condemn gaseous fuel where it does not pay as to advise its use where some advantage is to be gained. You will understand that my remarks apply to coal gas only. As to producer or furnace gases, I know practically nothing, except that sometimes it pays better to burn your candle as a candle than make it into gas, and burn it as a gas afterward. The use of producer gas no doubt pays on a large scale; and things on a large scale, so far as gas is concerned, are not matters with which I have time to concern myself. ”

“ The fuels for gas-lighting are natural gas, carbureted water-gas, and coal-gas obtained by distilling coal, but there are different methods of producing the artificial gases. Coal-gas is produced analytically by distilling certain kinds of coal, but water-gas and producer-gas are made synthetically by the action of several constituents upon one another. Carbureted water-gas is made from fixed carbon, steam, and oil and also from steam and oil. Producer-gas is made by the action of steam or air or both upon fixed carbon. ”

“ One estimable feature in this system of gas-producing is that the production can be arrested for half a day without deranging the producer, the fuel and brickwork being sufficiently bulky to maintain a dull red heat for that period. Air cannot enter the grate unless the gases given off in the producer are withdrawn to the furnace; and when the gas valve of the furnace is reopened, the production of the gases is once more continued. ”

“ At this point let us note how a gas, suitable for an engine, is manufactured at least cost, the outlay being much less than in the case of illuminating gas which represents but one third of the coal placed in the distilling retorts. Instead of this process of distillation, “producer” gas is due to a modified combustion which gasifies all the fuel. In a producer of standard type, atmospheric oxygen comes into contact with the glowing carbon of the coal or wood, forming carbon dioxide, CO2. The heat generated by this union is taken up by the carbon dioxide and the nitrogen of the supplied air. ”

“ The content of gasoline in wet gas varies from one-half gallon to six gallons a thousand cubic feet of gas produced, depending upon its richness. Respondent's contracts provided, generally, that it should install and maintain the necessary pipe lines and connections from casing-heads or traps at the mouth of the well to its plant, through which the producer agreed to deliver the natural gas produced at the well and that respondent should extract the gasoline therefrom, respondent to pay the producer 33 1/3 per cent. ”

“ In producing the gas and steam for these engines only twenty-two tons of coal per hour are consumed, which speaks well for the efficiency of the engines. In addition to the steam, the daily consumption of producer gas for power purpose only is 28,512,000 cubic feet. Added to this figure for power gas, is another item of gas used in the factory for various purposes, which averages nearly 1,000,000 cubic feet per day, bringing the per diem consumption of gas by the company up to 29,512,000 cubic feet. ”

“ It is not as oil and candle are, a benefit which every one may obtain who is in need of it, and in such quantities as may best suit his means and convenience. One of the capital advantages, of the gas metre, however, is, that it makes gas a substitute for oil and candles, applicable under all circumstances, and that it enables the manufacturer without the least prejudice or chance of prejudice to his interest, to supply gas [212] in whatever quantities it may be demanded, and at a fair proportioned price. ”

“ Either petroleum or some of the products of its distillation at a low temperature, as naphtha, rhigolene, gasolene, etc., may be used in the manufacture of gas. These products are of little commercial value as compared with those, like kerosene, which are produced at a higher temperature, but for this reason they are of especial value for the manufacture of gas. The principles on which the manufacture of petroleum-gas depends do not differ much from those involved in the making of coal-gas. ”

“ But as the gas is at present supposed to be the only object in view, for the sake of the light which it yields, the other products being only accidentally connected with its extraction, let us leave the idea of profit on them out of the question, and with the utmost latitude of concession, require them only to stand as in part for a portion of the coal employed in the process, we have still the gas, an article which performs the functions of the oil, the tallow, or the wax for which it is substituted ”

“ In short, the advantages of natural gas as a fuel are so obvious to those who have given it a trial, that the prediction is made that, should the supply fail, many who are now using it will never return to the consumption of crude coal in factories, but, if necessary, convert it or petroleum into gas at their own works. ”

“ The importance of gas in the oil-producing industry has, therefore, become a question of great concern to the industry itself and to government, to the end that its function may be fully utilized without waste. ”

“ The great economic question, however, connected with the use of natural gas is, How will it affect the industrial interests of the country? There are grounds for the belief that a sufficient supply of natural gas may be found in the vicinity of Pittsburg to reduce the cost of fuel to such a degree as to make competition in the manufacture of iron, steel, and glass, in any part of the country where coal must be used, out of the question. ”

“ When the charge of keeping the agitating shaft of the lime machine in action, is intrusted to a workman, there is no positive security against his occasionally neglecting his duty, whereas by applying the gas metre to that purpose, the manufacturer is assured beyond the possibility of deception, that when gas is produced, that gas is as certainly purified, and a saving is effected in point of labour of the expence of two men, one during the day, and one during the night. ”

“ When we consider the before mentioned varieties of coal in an economical point of view, as fuel to be used in the gas-light process, for heating the retorts, it appears from a series of experiments that have been made under my direction, that the second class of coal comprehending those varieties which contain a larger quantity of carbon than bitumen (p. 45,) afford the most economical fuel, they act less on the grate bars, and fire bricks of the furnace than those varieties which take fire easily and burn briskly with a strong blaze. ”

“ Its next use for manufacturing purposes was made in a rolling mill in Armstrong county, Penn., in 1874, forty-seven years after it had been used at Fredonia, and twenty-nine years after it had been used to boil salt.
Now the use of natural gas as manufacturing fuel is universal, not alone over the spot where the gas is found, but in localities hundreds of miles away. It is one of the strangest developments of modern scientific ingenuity. ”

“ And so true is this, that if a main were to descend 100 feet below the base of the gas holder, and if the pressure of the gas in the main was only equal to sustain a column of water half an inch in height, the gas lamps could not be lighted at all, at a point so low, because the pressure of the gas is then in an equilibrium with the pressure of the atmosphere. Hence in lighting a town or district with coal gas, the best situation for the gas apparatus, as far at least as it regards the economy of the mains for distributing the gas, is the lowest part of the town or district. ”

“ Notwithstanding this guarded announcement, it is evident that the discovery of natural gas has begun a revolution in fuel, which will have permanent and far-reaching economic and social consequences, whether the supply of gas is limited or inexhaustible. ”

“ But the wealth of Midas and the wit of man cannot produce or reproduce a natural gas field. We cannot even reproduce the gas, for our manufactured product has only about half the heating value per unit of nature's own. [38]
Natural gas in some quantity is produced in twenty-four states. It is consumed in only thirty-five states, and is available only to about 7,600,000 consumers. [39] Its availability has been more localized than that of any other utility service because it has depended more on the caprice of nature. ”

“ Gas, the staple product from the distillation of coal three-quarters of a century ago, now, to all intents and purposes, is the by-product. The world could roll along very comfortably without it. Indeed, we may have to do so in the near future when the gas is stripped of every other marketable constituent, leaving only a mixture of methane and hydrogen gases to be burned under boilers to raise steam for the generation of electricity in enormous bulk. ”

“ It is to be hoped that among the numberless schemes of gas-manufacture which have recently been made public we may soon be provided with a gas which shall be sufficiently cheap and plentiful to be used not only for lighting and heating in private dwellings, but also for trade and manufacturing purposes in workshop and warehouse. ”

“ CHAPTER VI. HOW GAS IS MADE—ILLUMINATING OILS AND BYE-PRODUCTS. Accustomed as we are at the present day to see street after street of well-lighted thoroughfares, brilliantly illuminated by gas-lamps maintained by public authority, we can scarcely appreciate the fact that the use of gas is, comparatively speaking, of but recent growth, and that, like the use of coal itself, it has not yet existed a century in public favour. Valuable as coal is in very many different ways, perhaps next in value to its actual use as fuel, ranks the use of the immediate product of its distillation—viz., gas ”

“ The manufacturer is certain of obtaining what he has a just right to, value for the whole quantity of gas supplied, and the consumer is assured that if he wastes the gas unnecessarily, he must as he ought, pay the price of his own carelessness or profusion. ”

“ When the proprietor of the establishment, on the contrary, has recourse to the gas metre, not one of all these evils can occur without being liable to certain and instant detection. From the data which preceding experiments on the productiveness of the species of coal used at the establishment have furnished, the overseer of the works is always enabled to determine, from the portion of coal he finds used, how much gas ought to have been manufactured during any space of time that has elapsed, and also the portion of carbonizing fuel which was necessary for the production of that quantity of gas ”

“ Petroleum products are also largely utilized in gas manufacture for, (1) the production of “air-gas,” (2) the manufacture of oil-gas, and (3) the enrichment of coal-gas. For heating purposes, the stoves employed are practically kerosene lamps of suitable construction, though gasoline is used as a domestic fuel in the United States. The use of petroleum as liquid fuel is dealt with under Fuel, as is the employment of its products in motors, which has greatly increased the demand for petroleum spirit. ”