WILL-O’-THE-WISP GAS.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIII, Issue 4383, 27 February 1922, Page 2

WILL-O’-THE-WISP GAS.

WGRLD-WIDR TESTS OF NEW SOURCE OF POWER. Over" the whole world chemists are at work on the new' discovery of manufacturing gas from decayed vegetable animal- matter, and remarkable advances are being achieved, in Australia (at Parramatta), in India (at Bombay),. in the United States, and, above all, at > Birmingham and Rothamsted, Hertfordshire, where Lord Elveden’s wartime discovery is being developed. The power from sewage gas is being used at(Cole Hall, near Birmingham, as it is oh a smaller scale on a farm in Kent, ■ In reference to calamities in the United States due to the amount of poison in the coaLgas used there, an, analysis has been made of this will-o’-the-wisp or marsh gas, and it IS found to contain at the most 1.1 per cent, of carbon-imonoxide, which is the chief dangei- in certain qualities of domestic gasj One of .the pioneers of this new form of gas is, Mr J. D. of the Birmingham Corporation; and a paper he read on the subject two months ago to the municipal and county engineers has given astonishing stimulus to the practical <feide of the discovery. He laid great stress on the comparative cheapness of the apparatus. ' Every experiment on the subject confirms the belief of those who are engaged in the investigation that a real, practical source of power has been tapped. The gas is being praci tically used, and all that remains is further technical experiments in the method of treating the sludge, manure, cut grass or leaves so that the store of gas is most effectively released.