524 



GAS WORKS IN GERMANY. 



There are in Germany 2G6 gas works, of which 66 are worked by 

 townships or individuals, and 200 belong to varions companies. 



The combustible employed is chiefly coal, the largest quantity being 

 supplied from England. Out of 7^ million quintals 3,350,000 are ob- 

 tained from the English collieries. Berlin, which produces annually 

 800 million cubic feet of gas uses about half of this quantity of coal. 

 Hamburg takes more than 500,000 quintals, and the rest is used hi the 

 gas works of Altona, Lubeck, Rostock, Stralsund, Stettin, Dantzic, 

 Konigsberg, &c. The exceUent quality of the English coal for gas- 

 making causes the preference to be given to it over indigenous coal, but 

 if the cost of transport of the latter can be cheapened it is thought that 

 it will ere long come into use in Hamburg, Berlin, and other towns. 



The following are the per centage proportions in which the various 

 coal is used in Germany : — 



English coal 46.00 



Westphalia 18.00 



Moravia 11.50 



Zwickau 7.50 



Saarbuck 7.00 



Silesia 5.00 



Dresden 2.25 



Bohemia 2.00 



Northern Bavaria . . . . . . .0.75 



100. 



Besides the gas-works which consume coal Germany possesses twenty 

 in which wood alone is employed for distillation ; and there are two 

 small works in Holstein which consume peat or turf at certain times, 

 and at others coal. 



The retorts used are generally of clay, except in those works 

 where gas is made from wood. The total number of retorts employed 

 is estimated at 7,337, made for the most part in the immediate locality 

 of the works ; their form and size differs considerably. 



Assuming that the mean consumption of gas in Jhe 24 hours is 

 25 millions of cubic feet, and supposing that each retort furnishes daily 

 4,500 cubic feet, it follows that these 7,337 retorts must be continuaUy or 

 three-fourths of the time in work. 



The use of extractors is much less general than would be supposed. 

 There are only ninety, or less than a third of the whole of the gas-works 

 in Germany which employ about 107 extractors. The small works 

 do not employ them at all. 



The meters in general use are water-meters of native manufacture, 

 and may number about 130,000, the mean number of lights of each 

 is about eight. — Journal de V Eclairage au Gaz. 



