|
Gasworks
A gasworks or gas house is an industrial plant for the production of flammable gas. Many of these have been made redundant in the developed world by the use of natural gas, though they are still used for storage space. Early gasworks Coal gas was introduced to Great Britain in the 1790s as an illuminating gas by the Scottish inventor William Murdoch. Early gasworks were usually located beside a river or canal so that coal could be brought in by barge. Transport was later shifted to railways and many gasworks had internal railway systems with their own locomotives. Early gasworks were built for factories in the Industrial Revolution from about 1805 as a light source and for industrial processes requiring gas, and for lighting in country houses from about 1845. Country house gas works are extant at Culzean Castle in Scotland and Owlpen in Gloucestershire. Equipment A gasworks was divided into several sections for the production, purification and storage of gas. Ret ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Launceston Gas Works
The Launceston Gasworks is a former industrial site located in the CBD of Launceston, Tasmania. The site was the principal supplier of gas to the City of Launceston before the importation of LPG in the 1970s. The gasworks produced gas by heating coal and siphoning off the gas that it released before refining and storing it on site in a set of 3, steel frame gasometers. The first buildings on site were the horizontal retort buildings built in 1860 from sandstone and local brick. The site was later used by Origin Energy as their Launceston LPG outlet. The site is instantly recognizable by its 1930s, steel braced, vertical retort building with the words "COOK WITH GAS" in the brickwork. History Starting in 1826, Launceston was lit with lamps running on sperm whale oil. These lamps were unpopular and local butchers soon replaced these with "slush" lamps that burned animal fat. These lamps were still disliked by many so in 1844 a local man, Doctor William Russ Pugh (a statue ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Illuminating Gas
The history of gaseous fuel, important for lighting, heating, and cooking purposes throughout most of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, began with the development of analytical and pneumatic chemistry in the 18th century. The manufacturing process for "synthetic fuel gases" (also known as "manufactured fuel gas", "manufactured gas" or simply "gas") typically consisted of the gasification of combustible materials, usually coal, but also wood and oil. The coal was gasified by heating the coal in enclosed ovens with an oxygen-poor atmosphere. The fuel gases generated were mixtures of many chemical substances, including hydrogen, methane, carbon monoxide and ethylene, and could be burnt for heating and lighting purposes. Coal gas, for example, also contains significant quantities of unwanted sulfur and ammonia compounds, as well as heavy hydrocarbons, and so the manufactured fuel gases needed to be purified before they could be used. The first attempts to manuf ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coal Gas
Coal gas is a flammable gaseous fuel made from coal and supplied to the user via a piped distribution system. It is produced when coal is heated strongly in the absence of air. Town gas is a more general term referring to manufactured gaseous fuels produced for sale to consumers and municipalities. The original coal gas was produced by the coal gasification reaction, and thus the burnable component consisted of a roughly equal molecular mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen. Thus, coal gas was highly toxic. Other compositions contain additional calorific gases such as methane, produced by the Fischer-Tropsch process, and volatile hydrocarbons together with small quantities of non-calorific gases such as carbon dioxide and nitrogen. Prior to the development of natural gas supply and transmission—during the 1940s and 1950s in the United States and during the late 1960s and 1970s in the United Kingdom and Australia—almost all gas for fuel and lighting was manufactured fr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Murdoch
William Murdoch (sometimes spelled Murdock) (21 August 1754 – 15 November 1839) was a Scottish engineer and inventor. Murdoch was employed by the firm of Boulton & Watt and worked for them in Cornwall, as a steam engine erector for ten years, spending most of the rest of his life in Birmingham, England. Murdoch was the inventor of the oscillating cylinder steam engine, and gas lighting is attributed to him in the early 1790s, as well as the term "gasometer". However the Dutch-Belgian Academic Jean-Pierre Minckelers had already published on coal gasification and gas lighting in 1784, and had used gas to light his auditorium at the University of Leuven from 1785. Archibald Cochrane, 9th Earl of Dundonald, had also used gas for lighting his family estate from 1789 onwards. Murdoch also made innovations to the steam engine, including the sun and planet gear and D slide valve. He invented the steam gun and the pneumatic tube message system, and worked on one of the first B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
.jpg "Click for more on -> William Murdoch")