Scientific American Supplement, No. 497, July 11, 1885Various
Science
Scientific American Supplement, No. 497, July 11, 1885
Various
Science -- Periodicals
Having said thus much of an industry now in its infancy but promising
great growth, I submit tables of analyses of common and of the natural
or marsh gas, the latter from a paper recently prepared by a committee
of the Engineers' Society of Western Pennsylvania, and for the use of
which I am indebted to that association:
COMMON GAS.
Hydrogen 46.0
Light carbureted hydrogen (marsh gas) 39.5
Condensible hydrocarbon 3.8
Carbonic oxide 7.5
" acid 0.6
Aqueous vapor 2.0
Oxygen 0.1
Nitrogen 0.5
-----
100.0
Natural gas is now conveyed to Pittsburg through four lines of 5-5/8
inch pipe and one line of eight inch pipe. A line of ten inch pipe is
also being laid. The pressure of the gas at the wells is from 150 to 230
pounds to the square inch. As the wells are on one side eighteen and on
the other about twenty-five miles distant, and as the consumption is
variable, the pressure at the city cannot be given. Greater pressure
might be obtained at the wells, but this would increase the liability
to leakage and bursting of pipes. For the prevention of such casualties
safety valves are provided at the wells, permitting the escape of all
superfluous gas. The enormous force of this gas may be appreciated from
a comparison of, say, 200 pounds pressure at the wells with a two ounce
pressure of common gas for ordinary lighting. The amount of natural gas
now furnished for use in Pittsburg is supposed to be something like
25,000,000 cubic feet per day; the ten inch pipe now laying is estimated
to increase the supply to 40,000,000 feet. The amount of manufactured
gas used for lighting the same city probably falls below 3,000,000 feet.
About fifty mills and factories of various kinds in Pittsburg now use
natural gas. It is used for domestic purposes in two hundred houses.
Its superiority over coal in the manufacture of window glass is
unquestioned. That it is not used in all the glass houses of Pittsburg
is due to the fact that its advantages were not fully known when the
furnaces were fired last summer, and it costs a large sum to permit the
furnaces to cool off after being heated for melting. When the fires cool
down, and before they are started up again, the furnaces now using
coal will doubtless all be changed so as to admit natural gas. The
superiority of French over American glass is said to be due to the fact
that the French use wood and the Americans coal in their furnaces, wood
being free from sulphur, phosphorus, etc. The substitution of gas for
coal, while not increasing the cost, improves the quality of American
glass, making it as nearly perfect as possible.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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