SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 
Vor. 2.] JUNE, 1920. [No. 6. 
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of-their source. 
Fuel Economy and the Carbonization 
of Coal. 
INGE the Industrial Revolution coal has been, is now, and will 
_remain, the chief source of energy for heat and motive power. 
His modern rival—mineral oil—ig strictly limited in supply. 
The world’s production of coal is over 1,200 million tons a 
year; that of crude oil about 75 million tons, or less than 10 per cent. | 
of the heating power of the coal. : 
Moreover, the reserves of coal are more than 7,000,000 million tons, 
er about 6,000 times the annual consumption; whereas the petroleum 
reserves are only 5,000 million tons, or a little over 60 times the present 
consumption per year. It is estimated that 469 million tons of coal 
were used in the United States alone, in 1917, for steam-raising. _ The 
most conservative estimate of coal used by ocean-going ships annually 
cannot be less than 60 million tons, equal to 40 million tons of fuel 
oil; and, since not more than one-third of the crude oil produced at 
the well is available for ships, it will be impossible to convert even all 
the ocean-going tonnage to the use of oil-fuel, if petroleum wells are 
to remain the sole sources of supply. As will be seen later, however, 
coal is destined in future to play a much more important réle in oil 
production than it has done hitherto. The many advantages of oil- 
fuel—its compactness, ease of transport, flexibility in use for heat, 
C.9946.—2, 321 
