British Coal Utilisation Research Association (BCURA) was a non-profit association of industrial companies, incorporated 23 April 1938 and dissolved 24 February 2015.

History

It was founded in 1938, with an assured income of £25000 per year for five years, supplied by the

Mining Association of Great Britain The Mining Association of Great Britain (MAGB) was an industry association of employers in the mining industry of Great Britain that was active from 1854 to 1954. History The Mining Association of Great Britain was established in 1854 to represe ...

and a grant from the government

Department of Scientific and Industrial Research Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, abbreviated DSIR was the name of several British Empire organisations founded after the 1923 Imperial Conference to foster intra-Empire trade and development. * Department of Scientific and Industria ...

, establishing a research station in

West Brompton West Brompton is an area of west London, England, that straddles the boundary between the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham and Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. The centuries-old boundary traced by Counter's Creek, probably marke ...

. It was formed from the research department of the Combustion (''formerly Coal-burning'') Appliance Manufacturer's Association becoming a separate entity. Laboratories were also later established in

Leatherhead Leatherhead is a town in the Mole Valley district of Surrey, England, about south of Central London. The settlement grew up beside a ford on the River Mole, from which its name is thought to derive. During the late Anglo-Saxons, Anglo-Saxon ...

. The first Director was

John G. Bennett John Godolphin Bennett (8 June 1897 – 13 December 1974) was a British academic and writer. He is best known for his books on psychology and spirituality, particularly on the teachings of G. I. Gurdjieff. Bennett met Gurdjieff in Istanbul in O ...

. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

it developed small units for the manufacture of

producer gas Producer gas is a fuel gas manufactured by blowing air and steam simultaneously through a coke or coal fire. It mainly consists of carbon monoxide (CO), hydrogen (H2), as well as substantial amounts of nitrogen (N2). The caloric value of the pro ...

from coal to use in vehicles in place of petrol. A £1000,000 five-year programme was also begun with a view not only to the needs of wartime but also for industry afterwards with fuels and chemicals from coal and greater efficiency of domestic appliances. Following the Nationalisation of the British Coal Industry in 1946 it continued as an independent body with the support of the

National Coal Board The National Coal Board (NCB) was the statutory corporation created to run the nationalised coal mining industry in the United Kingdom. Set up under the Coal Industry Nationalisation Act 1946, it took over the United Kingdom's collieries on "ve ...

in place of the Mining Association. It developed the commercially successful Satchwell Automatic Controller for small-pipe heating systems. As the National Coal Board became the dominant industrial member of the Association the government decided to run down its grant from 1968 and NCB would take over BCURA as a subsidiary, which it did in 1971. However NCB felt BCURAs's income from contracts was small compared with its running costs and decided to concentrate research on its own Coal Research Establishment at Stoke Orchard and to close BCURA in the same year.Rise and fall of BCURA
''Nature'' 229 29 January 1971, 291 Some of the library stock is now in the

North of England Institute of Mining and Mechanical Engineers The North of England Institute of Mining and Mechanical Engineers (NEIMME), commonly known as The Mining Institute, is a British Royal Chartered learned society and membership organisation dedicated to advancing science and technology in the N ...

collection at th
Common Room of the Great North
in Newcastle upon Tyne.

Notable People

Rosalind Franklin Rosalind Elsie Franklin (25 July 192016 April 1958) was a British chemist and X-ray crystallographer. Her work was central to the understanding of the molecular structures of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), RNA (ribonucleic acid), viruses, coal ...

worked on porosity of coal during World War II.

Victor Goldschmidt Victor Moritz Goldschmidt (27 January 1888 – 20 March 1947) was a Norwegian mineralogist considered (together with Vladimir Vernadsky) to be the founder of modern geochemistry and crystal chemistry, developer of the Goldschmidt Classificatio ...

lectured on rare elements in coal ash during World War II.

Marcello Pirani Marcello Stefano Pirani (July 1, 1880 – January 11, 1968) was a German physicist known for his invention of the Pirani vacuum gauge, a vacuum gauge based on the principle of heat loss measurement. Throughout his career, he worked on advancing l ...

was scientific consultant during 1941—1947, concerned with carbonaceous materials resistant to high temperatures. Meredith Thring was there from the outset.Rob Thring (his son) ''The Independent'', 30 September 2006
/ref> The family of

have a web site that contains information about him and BCUR

Peter H. Given, Head of Organic Chemistry, went on to Pennsylvania State University, achieving distinction in U.S

BCURA activities were subject of a review published in Nature Volume 153 Number 3873 p 104 (22 January 1944).

References

External links

bcura.org
British research associations Coal mining in the United Kingdom Coal organizations 1938 establishments in the United Kingdom Non-profit organisations based in the United Kingdom Organisations based in Cheltenham Scientific organisations based in the United Kingdom Scientific organizations established in 1938 2015 disestablishments in the United Kingdom {{nonprofit-org-stub