Heating and Power Production United.
In the bill of particulars drawn up by Mr. Stott it was shown that no less than 60.1 per cent. of the total heat from his fuel had gone into the condenser where, joined to the stream of the East River, it had been wasted. Had he used non-condensing motors the loss in exhausts would have been larger, and yet when a non-condensing motor is joined to a heating plant the whole investment may be much more profitable than where condensing motors throw away all the heat of their exhausts. Long ago some pioneer of unrecorded name, using a non-condensing steam engine, warmed his factory or mill with its exhaust steam. In summer that steam sped idly into the air, in winter it saved him so much coal that his motive power cost him almost nothing. By thus uniting the production of power and heat he showed, as few men have shown, how a great waste may be exchanged for a large profit. In the Northern States and in Canada the main use for fuel is for heating not only dwellings, but the furnaces that pour out iron and steel, the ovens that bake pottery, tiles, and so on. When but moderate temperatures are desired, as in warming a house, exhaust steam serves admirably, and so might the exhausts from gas engines. Indeed we here strike the key-note of modern fuel economy which is that wherever possible fuel should first deliver all the motive power that can be squeezed out of it, when and only when the remainder of its heat, much the larger part of the whole, should be used for warming.[43] This plan, already adopted in a good many cases, can be vastly extended with profit. In blast furnaces the first task of the fuel is performed at an extreme temperature; that work completed the gases of combustion may be purified and sent into gas engines to produce motive power at little cost.
[43] An excellent work, “The Heating and Ventilating of Buildings,” by Rolla C. Carpenter, professor of experimental engineering, Cornell University, is published by John Wiley & Sons, New York. Fourth edition, largely rewritten and fully illustrated. 1902, $4.00. It incidentally describes the best methods of heating with exhaust steam.