Burning Mud

1902

Nowadays everything that will burn is interesting. A fuel works at Stangflorden, in Norway, where peat is made into a useful fuel, should be of especial interest to Massachusetts, which is said to be talking of opening up its extensive peat beds. The factory at Stangflorden is run by electricity generated by water power, and has been in operation since 1898. The chief difficulty in manufacturing fuel from peat is getting rid of the water with which it is always soaked. About eighty-five per cent, by bulk is water, and practically all of this must be removed before a satisfactory fuel is obtained. At Stangflorden the wet peat is brought to the factory in boats, from which it is removed by electric conveyors and submitted to a preliminary rough drying and pressing. The briquettes thus formed are placed in chambers, through which warm, dry air is driven, and are finally placed in electrically heated retorts, where the drying is completed.

The peat yields, besides these briquettes, tar, charcoal, creosote, sulphate of ammonia and other by products. The electric power is obtained from five eighty-kilowatt dynamos. The plant is capable of turning out 1000 centners (a centner is about 110 pounds) of air-dried peat a day. The fuel is said to burn well, yields little soot and ash and is really salable in Bergen and other towns.