Producer-gas Possibilities in Germany
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AA ccoRpING to information received from .1.,Swiss sources there are now 60,000 industrial vehicles in Germany operating on liquid gas, chiefly methane, but only 14,000, so far, employ solid fuels of one kind or another in gas producers. Until two years ago gas producers had made less headway in Germany than in certain other Continental countries, for out of 465,338 goods and passenger vehicles then in circulation, only 1,000 were equipped with gas machines, although 20,000 were already running on bottled gas.
It appears that the gas producer is now being given very serious attention in the Reich, and during last May 10 new types were passed for service by the German Transport Ministry. Five of these employ wood fuel and the remainder lignite coke. The latter fuel is marketed in grains of 10 mm. to 12 mm., and a coarser grade with grains up to 30 mm. Humidity content must not exceed 10 per cent.
Wood, peat, lignite coke and anthracite are the principal fuels employed in German gas producers.
If we take the Swiss figure of 74,000 as representing the number of vehicles now running on substitute fuels, this leaves a balance of 391,338 not accounted for. In present circumstances it may be safely assumed that these vehicles are not operating on petrol or Diesel oil. Germany holds, unfortunately, enormous oil reserves, but such fuels must, nevertheless, be far too precious to allow for anything other than militar3L purposes.
A fair proportion may have been taken over for Army work, but very many vehicles must be lying idle at a moment when road transport is desperately needed to relieve the railway situation. No wonder, then, that gas producers are booming to a limited extent, but the price of wood fuel appears to be doing likewise, hard wood having risen to 5 R.M. 15 pfgs.' per kilo., which would represent about 2s. 7id. per lb. at normal exchange values. Only hard woods, such as oak or alder, are suitable for gas-prodirer work, and there is probably a shortage of these in Germany. Even so, the price is not actually prohibitive in view of the fact that vehicles simply must be put into service again by some means or another.
Shortly before war broke out the Rome municipal bus concern equipped 40 of their Fiat buses with wood-burning gas machines. These were 80-passenger vehicles, each with a six-cylindered engine developing 70 b.h.p. on gas. The fuel consumption on full load worked out at 1_63 kilos. of wood per kilometre. If the German appliances give equal results, the operation of heavy-duty lorries an wood fuel for urgent work should be possible, although costly.