Excerpt from The Analysis of Coal With Phenol as a Solvent I. Present 'methods of Coal Analysis. - There are two processes in vogue at the present time for the chemical examination of coal; one is the ultimate, and the other is the proximate method of analysis. In the first the organic or' combustible part Of the coal is separated into its elemental constituents, carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen. The mineral or non-combustible portion is separately determined under two items as ash and moisture. In the proximate method the organic material is separated into two divisions, one being that portion which under high temperature and out Of Contact with the air passes off in the gaseous form, and the other that part which remains behind as the non-volatile or coke-form ing carbon. Each procedure has doubtless come into use as the result of a specific demand. For example, the engineer needed the data from which he could calculate the total heat of the coal and, in arriving at a heat balance, he must also have at hand any negative factors charge able to the fuel, such as the quantity and character of the gaseous products of combustion. These items, therefore, would call for the data furnished by the ultimate methods of analysis.' The proximate method was developed as a natural accompaniment of the gas and coke industries, since it furnished in either case an index of the yield which might be expected from a given coal. Formerly, also, the quantity of volatile matter was made to serve as an index of the grade or quality of a coal. Thus the data from proximate analyses have been put into the form of fuel ratios or the ratio of the non-volatile to the volatile part of the coal, such ratios supposedly serving as an indication of the general class or type to which the coal belonged. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.