SOAIE PRACTICAL ASPECTS OF FUEL ECONOMY 



By carl W. MITMAN 



divisions of mineral and mechanical technology 

 united states national museum 



Some ten years ago a large manufacturer in New England was 

 approached with a proposal for materially bettering his fuel practice. 

 The proposal was rejected on the grounds that coal represented less 

 than 10 per cent of the cost of production, that a lo per cent saving 

 on this meant a saving of less than i per cent on the whole operation, 

 and that economies of far greater consequence had prior claims to 

 attention — in short, that the power plant was the least source of 

 worry. Since then, however, this particular plant, in search of relief 

 from its coal troubles, installed an oil burning equipment only to get 

 caught in the rise of fuel oil prices and revert to coal, and on at least 

 one occasion has been entirely shut down for lack of fuel. 



The case is fairly typical and serves to bring out two points of 

 fundamental importance : ( i ) That the fuel question has grown to be 

 of major significance and (2) that its growth has been so rapid — 

 largely within the last decade — that there scarcely has been time to 

 work out the answer in standard form available to the average user. 

 Thus, while consumers in general have come to appreciate these 

 changing conditions to a greater or less degree, they have not been 

 uniformly in a position to cope with them. 



Power plant operations large enough to have the benefit of their 

 own expert advice are able to work out the answer to their particular 

 problems and are reasonably up to date in the way of equipment and 

 operation. The average consumer, however, having no expert advice 

 to bring to bear upon his problem, is dependent upon established 

 practice, and in the absence of standards is still operating in the dark. 

 The object of this writing is to bring out to what extent the average 

 consumer may reasonably expect to profit from available data. 



THE FURNACE A CHEMICAL PLANT 



Combustion is a chemical reaction and a furnace is in reality a 

 chemical plant manufacturing heat units. As such, the furnace opera- 

 tion falls into the same category with any other chemical process 



Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections, Vol. 76, No. 1 



