Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 93, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 April 1920 — NEW FUEL FLUID SURPASSES OIL [ARTICLE]

NEW FUEL FLUID SURPASSES OIL

St Louis, Mo., April 15.—(Special) —Colloid chemistry, dealing with substances composed of units too small to be seen separately with the naked eye, yet larger than molecules, was a special order on the program of the American Chemical society at its closing session today. A new fuel fluid of greater heat value 4 per unit than either coal or fuel oil, and hence particularly valuable as a. fuel for steamships and battleships, giving them a wider cruising radius, was described during the discussion of colloids in a paper by Jerome Alexander, a New York chemist, which was read by Dr. Harry N. Holmes of Oberlin college, chairman of the National Colloid Research council. The paper declared the new fuel utilizes coal waste and cheap tars, these ingredients being dispersed in fuel oil by colodial action, and that the addition of a certain fixing agent, whose nature is kept secret, results in a fuel which combines the valuable qualities for heating of both oil and coal. Peat, lignite, cellulose waste, sawdust, and similar • inferior fuels may be utilized in the new process, Prof. Alexander declared. He said that the new fuel could be piped, stored, and burned virtually as fuel oil is, and that as a fuel for steamships it is virtually double the value of either coal or present forms of fuel oil. He also declared the new fuel to be very valuable for laying smoke screens in warfare.