Cannel coal

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Cannel coal from the Pennsylvanian of NE Ohio

Cannel coal or candle coal is a type of

boghead coal, a more recent classification system restricts cannel coal to terrestrial origin, and boghead coal to lacustrine environments.[2]

Composition

Cannel coal is brown to black oil shale.[3] It comes from resins, spores, waxes, and cutaneous and corky materials of terrestrial vascular plants, in part from

Lycopsid (scale tree).[4][6] Cannel coal was accumulated in ponds and shallow lakes in peat-forming swamps and bogs of the Carboniferous age under oxygen-deficient conditions.[6] Thus cannel coal seams are shallow and often found above other deposits, while the coal itself, being rich in oils, burns long, with a bright yellow flame and little ash. The modern Lycopodiopsida relatives of these lycopsids (scale trees), with their similar high oil content, high surface area spores, are the source of highly flammable lycopodium powder
.

Cannel coal is also lower in fixed carbon than typical bituminous coal. It includes various amounts of

exinite
group, and certain inorganic materials.

History

Cannel coal beads

Cannel coal has been used as jewellery since the neolithic, with pieces appearing in Scotland (often alongside

jet) dating from the centuries before 3500BC.[7]

In England a member of the Bradshaigh family discovered a plentiful shallow seam of smooth, hard, cannel coal on his estate, in Haigh, Lancashire in the 16th century.[8][9] The shallow depth at which it was found meant it was suitable for the simple surface mining methods available at that time. It could be worked and carved, and was prized for fireplaces as an excellent fuel that burned with a bright flame, was easily lit, and left virtually no ash.

Cannel coal commanded a premium price as a grate fuel for use in home fireplaces. It burned longer than wood, and had a clean, bright flame.[10] It is more compact and duller than ordinary coal[citation needed], and can be worked in the lathe and polished.[11] In the Durham coalfield and elsewhere carving cannel coal into ornaments was a popular pastime amongst the miners.

The excess of

manufactured gas industry, as the gas produced from it was valuable for lighting due to the luminosity of the flame it produced. Cannel gas was widely used for domestic lighting throughout the 19th century before the invention of the incandescent gas mantle by Carl Auer von Welsbach
in the 1880s. Following the introduction of the gas mantle, cannel coal lost favour as a manufactured gas feedstock as the gas mantle could produce large quantities of light without regard for the flame luminosity of the gas burnt.

Sculpture of a boot in Cannel coal in the collection of the Black Country Living Museum

On October 17, 1850,

Drake Oil Well in 1859, made petroleum a cheaper raw material for making kerosene and drove the American oil shale industry out of business.[12]

In June 1857, a large gathering to celebrate the laying of a foundation stone of a pedestal on which to raise the retired Locomotion No 1 outside the Stockton and Darlington Railway Station (now North Road Station and Darlington Railway Museum - Head of Steam) witnessed that inside a special cavity in the pedestal were laid many items as a time capsule, and a cannel coal box made by a driver of the locomotive, Robert Murray, as a tribute to Edward Pease (often known as the "Father of the Railways").[13]

See also

References

  1. USGS
    Geological Survey Bulletin 1120. p. 7.
  2. ^ a b Hutton(1987)
  3. ^ a b Dyni (2006), pp. 3–4
  4. ^ a b Speight (2012), pp. 6–7
  5. ^ Han et al. (1999)
  6. ^ a b Stach (1975), p. 428
  7. S2CID 148566747
    . Retrieved 11 February 2017.
  8. ^ "Haigh Hall - England". Clanlindsay.com. Archived from the original on 2010-01-03. Retrieved 2013-03-30.
  9. ^ Manchester Engineers & Inventors (3), Manchester 2002, archived from the original on 2012-05-09, retrieved 18 April 2012
  10. ^ Ashley (1918), p. 35
  11. ^ a b Bauerman 1911, p. 576.
  12. ^ Ashley (1918), p. 43
  13. ^ D&S Times, June 13th, 1857, No 508, Columns 1, 2, 3 & pt4, The original Locomotive Engine

Bibliography

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