Victorian Coal Chute

[Cosmic]

There is a guy in Braintree, Ma that I used to use. They still have those trucks and could deliver the old fashion way.

C o a l a n d N a t u r a l C h a r c o a l (http://mywilliamsenergy.com/coal.html - broken link)

A lot of their business is not just houses. That area still has businesses that use coal. Some hospitals, factories, etc have their own power house, make their own electric, heat, AC, full utilily type service. Very cheap compared to gas or oil.

The hard coal is superior. Lot of that stuff was in the 12,000 - 14000 btu / lb range. Burned very clean. The soft coals are typically only about half that. The lignite stuff they use down in TX was only a tad over 3000 btu / lb about like burning high grade dirt.

The chuckle is that Williams guy makes a big deal about their blacksmith coals. It really is the screening from coal handling in the yard. Can make your own by buying the biggest lumps available and grinding it to the right size. Wished I still had a good source. If you are going to use fossil fuel, probably the best way to go.

[thecoalman]

Originally Posted by Cosmic

The hard coal is superior. Lot of that stuff was in the 12,000 - 14000 btu / lb range. Burned very clean. The soft coals are typically only about half that.

That is a misconception, a typical hard coal is about the same as a typical soft coal. In fact the BTU rating for some soft coal can sometimes exceed that of the best hard coal. Where they differ is the composition, anthracite is nearly all carbon. Because of that you get a nice clean burn, it's "smokeless" and produces a blue flame. With soft coal even for the experienced user you're going to have soot going out the chimney.






It also has less sulfur so odor is minimal, you need to be practically on top of the chimney to smell it. As I said above you walk into my home and you would never know it was heated by coal either inside or outside... except that it's nice and warm and my wallet is fat.

It also has less volatile content, what happens with soft coal especially if you try and burn it hard is that the impurities form what is called a clinker. This is a rock hard mass that looks like lava and can grow quite large in the firebox, it has to be manually removed. Anthracite burns up to almost talcum powder under any burning conditions whether it's just idling along or going full force.

For all of the above reasons anthracite is excellent for home heating especially when compared to soft coal. That is refelceted in the price as well as it is typically double the cost of soft coal at the point of processing. I've see prices as high as $350 which is more than 6X the average cost of soft coal but people will pay it.