100 years ago today-- heating fuel choices

PRR

140 years ago -- oil versus coal on freight steamboats.

Central Pacific Railroad Company had a complex history, but seems to now be an aspect of Union Pacific.
$1.70 for 40 gallons of oil is round-about 240 pounds or a shy eighth-ton. So it does not seem cheaper on actual fuel value unless the coal was crap. But they "got rid of" firemen, good capitalist policy.
PS- HOW can I tell it not to blow-up small images until they vanish in the haze? It is not respecting the IMG tags listed on the Simple HTML link below the edit-box.

PRR

The Big Sleep

by Raymond Chandler
1939 (derived from stories published 1935-1936).

There was a gusty wind blowing in at the windows and the soot from the oil burners of the hotel next door was down-drafted into the room and rolling across the top of the desk like tumbleweed drifting across a vacant lot. The coffee shop smell from next door came in at the windows with the soot but failed to make me hungry. So I got out my office bottle and took the drink and let my self-respect ride its own race.

Action happens in California, Even in the late 1950s, the LA basin, land and sea, was dotted with oil wells and pump-jacks; and little coal nearby. So makes sense oil would be interesting even if they didn't yet know how to make burners run clean.

And I'd never sat down and read the book before. I hadn't realized just what sleaze it is. It may actually be #98 of the top 100 books of the 20th century, but that may not be a good thing. The only person Marlowe respects is the 95yo millionaire.

PRR

1889 … folks liked the idea of oil but it was another 35 years arriving. The infrastructure to move large lumps of liquids didn't exist until high-ton trucks, plus the coal strikes.

oil-April1889-SciAm.gif

ChrisJ

https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1801637#Comment_1801637

Oil weighs more than coal per btu?

PRR

jumper

There's still plenty of coal but low hanging fruit has been consumed. Nobody in 1936 dreamed that so much natural gas will be economically available as there is now. Eventually other power sources will be more practical than fossil fuels. But transition will take time.