ABSTRACT
This question of the by-product industries, and particularly “oil from coal”, is of vital importance, not only to the mining industry, but to the nation as a whole. The transition from the field of laboratory experiment to that of commercial exploitation has been one requiring infinite patience, bringing many disappointments and involving both loss of capital and heavy expenditure with no certainty of return. As in other fields, however, scientific research work has been crowned with success and brought its reward in the establishment, on a commercial scale, of at least two processes—low-temperature carbonization and hydrogenation. The former gives smokeless fuel, fuel oil, creosote, petrol, and gas, while the latter is a process devoted entirely to the production of oil. The quantity of petrol obtained by the low-temperature carbonization system is comparatively small, but the quality excellent. The expansion of the process is limited by the necessity for finding a market for the other by-products, particularly the coke. This difficulty should be overcome in time, for smokeless fuels have many advantages over raw coal for domestic use, and if produced in greater quantities and on sale at a lower figure, would doubtless command a ready market for increased sales.
