Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 92.djvu/313



ITH trillions of tons of coal in the ground, America is hard-pressed to furnish coal for munitions factories and steel plants; for the Army and Navy; and for domestic consumption.

There are not enough coal cars to transport coal needed for American consumption and for the maintenance of our Allies. If there were enough coal cars, there would not be enough locomotives to draw them. If coal cars could be provided, there would not be enough terminal trackage to handle the enormous increase of freight caused by the war.

The United States Fuel Administration asks that the American people, through measures of conservation in factory and home, fill the gap of fifty million tons which even the increased production of 1917 fails to fill.

Americans have customarily been wasteful of coal. There has always been plenty of coal, at a cost that has seemed very moderate. Why bother to be economical in the use of it? The average man-of-the-house, who manages his own furnace, might be more frugal of his fuel if he realized that every shovelful of coal that he throws into the greedy maw of the ogre in the cellar, represents in money value the price of a loaf of bread or a pint of milk.

From the viewpoint of people fairly well-to-do, the saving of a shovelful here and there has been too petty an affair to be worth considering.

Today, however, we are confronted by a new situation. Now it is everybody's business to save coal. Now coal means munitions and other war supplies. It means transportation. It means the winning of the war.

Yet, if every householder in the United States would save one kitchen shovelful of coal each day in the year, the total saving thereby accomplished in a twelvemonth would amount to 15,000,000 tons.

This quantity would keep 5,000,000 ordinary folks warm all winter. It would keep 7,500,000 soldiers comfortable all winter in cantonments. It would send a fleet of twenty-five battleships across the Atlantic Ocean 3000 times!

If consumers can be aroused to an intelligent consideration of the problem, it is very easily within their power to save, without any discomfort or inconvenience, 10 per cent or more of the coal they have been accustomed to use. They should realize that one man's careless and wasteful use of coal may mean a cold house for his neighbor, and that a few such careless householders may mean an idle factory.

The problem is personal. It deals with the human element. The man whom the Fuel Administration is trying to reach is the man with the shovel. He is the great big factor in the present coal problem. Mainly, upon him, and his willingness to save, must depend the success of the present movement for fuel economy.

In American households there are 15,000,000 coal-shovelers, men and women. When they feed coal to their furnaces and kitchen stoves, they do not realize that it is the very life-blood of the nation that is going into those hungry receptacles. To waste any coal, under present circumstances, is nothing short of criminal.

One-fifth of our total output of coal is used for domestic purposes. Three-fifths are consumed by the railroads and powerplants of the country. Here again comes in the man with the shovel, 250,000 strong.

The Fuel Administration is carrying on an active campaign of technical instruction in the industrial plants of the country. Experienced engineers give instruction in the most economical and efficient firing of furnaces.

As for the householder, he must realize that it is worth while to examine his dwelling and overhaul his heating equipment. Weather-strips, double windows, pipe-coverings, clean flues and chimneys, and tight fittings in furnace parts will all pay. When you save electricity and gas you save coal. Turn out all lights when they are not needed. Use gas sparingly. Clean heating surfaces are most essential.