un-warrented faith in the possibilities of general manufactured-gas long-distance transmission and distribution.



The true significance of cost-factor, peak-load characteristics, and house-heating demands must be frankly faced with an appreciation that the economic and not the engineering features are controlling. To curtail the enormous waste of the gas in beehive coke oven use, as shown in Figure 6, and secure an increasing use of by-product coke ovens, it will be necessary to reckon with the following:

a. Heating value standards for gas sold as the public-utility service must be lowered so as to create a market for and permit the general use of by-product coke-oven gas for public-utility service.^[17]

b. The advantages of ammonium sulphate as fertilizer must be stressed, soil conditions where it may be used, studied and ascertained, and a market for this by-product created and maintained.^[18]

c. Domestic consumers must be taught how to use coke for household heating purposes.

d. Legislation against the improper burning of bituminous coal and the smoke nuisance must be enacted and enforced.^[19]

e. In the lumber and grain industry, what is known as “milling-in-transit”^[20] principle permits the shipment of raw material , then milling it at some favorable location en route, and reshipping the milled products at the original through freight rate. This “milling-in-transit” principle must be applied to the coke industry so that when coal is shipped the by-products may be removed while the coal is en route and the residue coke reshipped at the original through freight rate. This will permit the location of by-product coke ovens at the most advantageous locations for the immediate utilization of gas and other by-products for the reason that it will not be feasible from an economic viewpoint to transmit by-product coke-oven gas long distance through pipes.

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^[17] For further discussion see Report of the committee Appointed to Investigate and Recommend the Most Economic and Satisfactory Calorific Standard for Gas in Baltimore with Special Reference to the Available Supply of By-product Coke Oven Gas Mixed with Carburetted Water Gas, Public Service Commission of Maryland, Baltimore, Maryland, July 1922, 182 pp.

^[18] Simthsonian  Institution, U. S. National Museum, Bulletin 102, part 2, Fertilizers: An Interpretation of the Situation in the United States, 22pp.

^[19] Smithsonian Institution, U. S. National Museum, Bulletin 102, part 1, Coal Products: An Object Lesson in Resource Administration, 16 pp.

^[20] There are many reported cases discussing the “milling-in-transit” principle applied to lumber and grain industries in the reports of the Interstate Commerce Commission.

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