A SUBSTITUTE FOR COAL.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume III, Issue 210, 3 October 1874, Page 2

A SUBSTITUTE FOR COAL.

It was stated a short time ago that a Belgian peasant had made the extraordinary discovery, that earth, coal, and soda, mixed up together, would burn as well and better than any other combustible, and the fact has since been proved beyond a doubt. The way in which he found this out was curious : —He had been scraping the floor of his cellar with a shovel, in order to bring all the bits of coal lying about into a heap, which, mixed as it was with earth and other impurities, he put into his stove. To his astonishment he found that this accidental compound burnt better instead of worse than he expected, and emitted much greater heat Being an intelligent man, he endeavored to discover the cause, and found that a good deal of soda, probably the remnant of the last wash, lay about on the floor of the cellar, and that some of it must have got into his heap. He then made a few experiments, and at length improved his compound sufficiently to render it practical. The publicity given in Belgium to this discovery caused trials to be made everywhere, and it has now been ascertained that three parts of earth and one of coaldust, watered with a concentrated solution of soda, will burn well and emit great heat. Many Parisian papers talked of it, but only one, the Moniteur, went so far as to make the experiment at its printing office. A certain quantity of friable and slightly sandy earth was mixed with the quantum of coal- dust prescribed ; the two ingredients were well incorporated with each other, and then made into a paste with the solution above mentioned. The fireplace of one of the boilers had previously been lighted with coa], and the fire was kept up with shovelfuls of the mixture. The latter, in a few seconds, was transformed into a dry brown crust, which soon after became red-hot, and then burnt brightly, but without beiug very rapidly consumed. The fact of the combustion is therefore well ascertained ; but before the system can be universally adopted, there are some important points to be considered, such as the calorific power of the mixture compared to that of pure coal, its price, and, above all, a remedy for the great drawback attaching to it —its fouling the firegrate considerably.