COAL GAS FOR PARIS TAXIS?
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The High Cost of Petrol and the Government Tax on It Directing Attention to the Use of Other Fuels.
TT may be remembered that during
the great war, in the days when Government drivers washed their vehicles in oceans of petrol, the precious fluid was rationed out to the civil user so severely as to render mechanical
road transport very difficult. In these. circumstances, coal gas, carried either in bags or cylinders, was used on quite a number of vehicles in Loudon and the provinces with fair success:
The industrial vehicle user in France
is faced with a serious -petrol crisis at the present time, not owing to any shortage of the fuel, but from its constantly rising 'nice. The rise is, of course, chiefly due to the drop in the purchasing value of the franc, but it is aggravated by the heavy Government tax on petrol, a tax which seems likely to be again increased in the near future.
Attempts are being made to cope with the situation by the substitution oE other fuels for petrol, and it is possible that we shall see coal gas employed again in the city of Paris for the propulsion of motor vehicles, and, in particular, taxicabs.
At a recent meeting of the Technical Committee of the Automobile Club de Prance, a paper was read by Colonel Lucas Giradville. dealing with the use of town gas in motor vehicles. The most interesting. feature of the meeting was the production of certain very light gas cylinders constructed by Messrs. Daudet and Donon. The weight of these cylinders for a given gas-contain
lug capacity is only .278 that of the ordinary gas cylinder of commerce, whilst the new cylinders are, said to be equally strong.
In commenting upon the new cylinders, another member of the committee, Colonel Ferrus, stated that, at the technical section of the French army mechanical transport during the war, he had made certain experiments with town gas. He found it possible to cover 5 kilometres, with a lorry, for an extra weight of, roughly, 70 kg. Coal gas is cheap in Paris, the price being 65 centimes per cubic metre at the moment. In round figures, 1 kg. of . Petrol produces about the same energy as two cubie metres of coal gas. That is to say, that with the present high price of petrol in France 1 franc 30 centimes worth of gas would do the same work as 3 francs 65 centimes worth of petrol. The saving is so remarkable that if the new cylinders be as good as they are claimed to be we shall soon hear more of them.