OIL FROM COAL

Hokitika Guardian, 24 December 1929, Page 5

OIL FROM COAL

UTILISATION OF BYPRODUCTS. IMPROVING OUTLOOK OF INDUSTRY. ■SYDNEY, Dec. 12. The coa.l crisis in the northern field of New South Wales has served to, revive the question of exploiting and utilising the by-product coal in the rich pcssnock-Greta" seam, and of establishing a secondary industry in the coal mining industry for the extraction, by the latest proceses, of oil and its residues for fertiliser. Both the Federal and State Governments have promised to investigate the possibilities of this new industry, as one means of putting new life into a field which has been in the throes of industry turmoil since about 1914. Men, however, like Mr J. M. Baddeley, who, as Minister for Mines in the Lang Labour Government, investigated these 'by-product processes abroad, are convinced that the position demands immediate action. Something will certainly have tc be done to give the industry a new outlook, for, apart from the present crisis, it has suffered, since 1914, no fewer, than 4500 strikes of one sort and another, involving the 'loss oi more than 8,090,000 working days It- is said by those advocating the fullest use of the State’s by-product coal that the genius of, German research and organisation will make it possible for that country, by the use of those processes, to be independent of American or other oil supplies within the next ten years. And that, il is observed, is a country without any natural oil supplies. Germany, it is stated, has so established this industry as to he in a position to send some of its fertiliser —the residue of coal oil—even to New Zealand. Private enterprise proposes to exploit this new field in New South Wales, but it is contended that the Federal and State Governments should take a hand in it. Tested tor oil in London, con I from the ( ossnock-Greta seam is said to have yielded excellent results.