THE COMING OF OIL FUEL.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 309, 22 May 1913, Page 8

THE COMING OF OIL FUEL.

CONCERN IN NEWCASTLE. The big coal export trade from New Soutli Wales! to the west coast of South America is being seriously threatened by the competition of oil fuel. Mr. John Brown, the well-known Newcastle colliery proprietor and shipping merchant, last week received two letters on the subject' from his Valparaiso house. It was stated that numbers of steamers engaged in the Chilean nitrate trade were using oil fuel in preference to coal, and one nitrate export company declared that it had. effected a saving of £12,000 during the last six months by using oil for that period, as against coal for the previous six months.' Taking into consideration the total cost of the handling, and usage of both kinds of fuel, it has been ascertained that oil was 3s Od 1 per ton less expensive than coal. It was therefore a great inducement to take up oil as a fuel in preference to coal.

'•That is what we are getting now, before the Panama Canal :s openel," said Mr. Brown, in discussing the letters with a Sydney press representative. "What will we get after it has been opened? It is a very serious matter for the tnen, and also for the coUeries R mav mean a reduction in the price of coal, and also in wages How -an tha proprietors so on in the face cf such n. state of affairs? If thejnen ;ire l aking claims upon the proprietors, which the latter cftnmot pay, how do they fxp«>t to get along? A lifference of 3s Od per ton exists in the price of oil and coal before the Canal is what will happen after the "»n:il is opened owl the oil can be bro i *ht to new markets? That is what <ve ure up against, and we want the men to it,"