International coal relations are further discussed in Chapter XVIII.[17]
Production in the United States. The main features of the distribution of coal supplies in the United States are:
(1) Localization of the anthracite production and reserves in a limited area in the Lawton region of Pennsylvania. Low-grade anthracite coal also occurs in Rhode Island, North Carolina, Colorado, and Idaho.
(2) Localization of the bituminous production in the eastern and interior states of Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Kentucky. The principal reserves of bituminous coal occur in the same provinces, but important additional reserves are known in Texas, in North and South Carolina, and in the Rocky Mountain and Pacific Coast provinces.
(3) The existence of large tonnages of subbituminous coal in the west, which have not been mined to any extent.
(4) The existence of large fields of lignite in the Gulf Coast region, and in the Northern Plains region, which have not been mined.
Coke. About one-sixth of the bituminous coal mined in the United States is made into coke, that is, it is subjected to heat in ovens from which oxygen is excluded in order to drive off the volatile gases (chiefly hydrocarbons and water) which constitute about 40 per cent of the weight of the coal. The residual product, the coke, is a light, porous mass with a considerably higher percentage of fixed carbon than bituminous coal. In regard to composition, coking accomplishes artificially somewhat the same result reached by nature in its slow development of high-grade coals, but the texture of coke is far different from that of coal. Not all bituminous coals are suitable for coke manufacture; and such coals are frequently divided into two classes, known as coking and non-coking coals. Coke is used principally for smelting purposes. Because of its spongy, porous texture, it burns more rapidly and intensely than coal.
The gases eliminated in coking are wasted in the old-fashioned "beehive" ovens, but in modern "by-product" coke ovens these gases by proper treatment yield valuable coal tar products and ammonia. It is estimated that the sum of the value of the products thus recovered from a ton of coal multiplies the value of the ton of coal at the mine by at least thirteen times. The importance of this fact from the conservational standpoint cannot be too much emphasized. At present over half of the total coke produced in the United States comes from by-product ovens, and this proportion will doubtless increase in the future.
BALANCE SHEET SHOWING CONTRAST BETWEEN VALUE OF 1 TON OF BITUMINOUS COAL AT MINE AND VALUE OF PRODUCTS WHICH IT CONTAINS, BASED ON CONDITIONS PREVAILING IN 1915.1