Fuel Research East Greenwich

 

I’m becoming increasingly aware that many people have no idea that on
the Greenwich Peninsula, where the Dome and everything is, was previously a huge and very important gas works.  It was actually a collection of all sorts of works - a big gasworks making ‘town’ – coal gas;  a big tar works,a chemical works. and various others. The one I want to write about today was the Fuel Research Station which was round the back of the Pilot pub in what was then a road called Riverway.

I had always assumed that the Fuel Research organisation had grown from  the gas company’ laboratories.  The South Metropolitan Gas Co which owned the East Greenwich Gas works had done a considerable amount of work during the Great War on poison and explosive gases. I’ve written a very great deal about George Livesey who was the 19^th century gas company chair who set up the gas works on the Peninsula.  I find it difficult to believe that he would have been enthusiastic about the various gases destined for military use as explosive and poison  which the gas works produced on an industrial scale during the Great War. By the time the war started Livesey was dead and the company chair was Dr Charles Carpenter. At the end of the war the company produced a booklet outlining wartime activity which included a chapter by Carpenter outlining with apparent  enthusiasm some of these products and the research which had preceded them. Whatever, it is easy to imagine that he had also been involved in setting up the Fuel Research organisation.

It turns out that I was completely wrong about this. The fuel research body was in during the Great War and it comes as a relief to discover that the Government during the Great War did do things like planning for the future and weren’t only sending thousands of young men to their deaths on the Somme.  The mining of coal, its use and sale, the setting up of the gas industry had all been done, unregulated, by ‘private enterprise’.  Was setting up this research organisation an attempt to evaluate national resources and to regulate their use accordingly?

The organisation was the idea of George Thomas Bielby, a distinguished Scottish chemist with an interest, among many others, of developments in coal based fuels and related subjects. In 1912 he was a member of the Royal Commission on Fuel and Engines for the Navy. During the Great  War  he was the  Director of  the Fuel Research Board and was responsible for setting up the research body.

Initially it had two objectives: one of which was  to research and classify all coal seams in the country. Initially this was referred to staff at Imperial College in South Kensington but eventually a large network was set up to deal with this and to work as a part of the new research body.  This consisted of nine specialist regional Coal Survey laboratories.  By 1945 57 reports had been produced –  but did not include any mention of the Kent coal field

Initially the other main research objective was about the processing of raw coal into different types of fuel -  It is said that this was because of concerns in fuelling naval vessels. It was realised that the research building should be near a gasworks and Bielby approached  Charles Carpenter  to see if the South Metropolitan Works at East Greenwich could help. East Greenwich was then, and was to remain, the most modern gasworks in the whole country,  very large and on the cutting of technology. It was an obvious choice.  A site was soon agreed at a peppercorn rent with access to a number of facilities including the Phoenix chemical works and also the rail  link into the gas works. A building  was constructed for them here  by the South Metropolitan Gas Works. It was claimed that this building was designed and erected by the local of firm of builders, Edge,- who included it in their company history .But please see one of my earlier articles about that Company.

News reports of the setting up of the facility at Greenwich give a number of subjects  on which the research work needed  to be done. I think that it was fundamentally felt that the nation needed to look at its coal reserves to see how they could best be used efficiently.  In particular, what was the best way to use coal to generate electricity and also what will become a huge need for ‘motor spirit’ in the future. How much coal have we got? How can it be used most efficiently?    We have forgotten that there was a time when oil did not come in tankers. Petrol was invented just across the River in Hackney Wick by Carless who also developed aviation spirit there .  Next time you see a film about the Battle of Britain keep in mind  - I was told that the Coalite plant at the local gas works could keep seven squadrons in the air.

It was announced that the new Greenwich facility  ‘will be designed and equipped in such a manner that operations on an industrial scale can be conducted under working conditions.’ Initially seven chemists were employed  - and were provided with their own small gas works  to experiment with.

In addition to coal; the researchers were asked to look at Irish peat - an energy resource which today barely registers. In April 1921  100 tons were delivered to the station in Greenwich so that work on it could start.    A lecture and paper on Peat Resources in Ireland was produced in 1919. 

There were reports that ’oil fuel is beginning to have a serious effect upon the coal industry. ..our greatest scientists and chemists are working at high pressure  ...to save the coal industry, and at Greenwich ...making secret experiments in distilling oil from coal  ... to  make Britain independent of foreign countries for her oil supplies and prevent the closing of pits, and consequent unemployment.’    In May 1925 a deputation of Members of Parliament visited the Greenwich facility panicked by all the reasons for a crisis  and reported favourable work on coal oils. The Prime Minister, Tory Stanley Baldwin, described the problems in the coal industry and said how research in Greenwich would solve it ”it will give this country probably the greatest push forward in  development that it has had since the discovery of steam.”

By 1930 an experimental low carbonisation plant was being run at Richmond Gas Works in what was then still Surrey at works owned by the north London Gas Light and Coke Co and apparently installed at the request of the Government. Soon workers at Greenwich could boast of making ‘super grade petrol’  from ‘worthless tar’.  Petrol costing 3 ½d  a gallon could be made for  2 ½d.

(For  you poor souls -  readers - who can’t convert thruppence  or tuppence ‘apence to today’s money – both of them are nearest to a penny – 2p...... for a gallon?)

In 1934 the site was visited by a party made up of hundreds of industrialists  and eminent scientists. Reporting in The Kentish Independent it was obviously felt necessary to explain to local people what this building on their doorstep was all about.  They reported ‘ the main object of the work is the application of  the better use of the coal resources of the country which still remain Great Britain’s most important material asset and the foundation of her industrial greatness.”

1939 meant the start of the Second World War. Immediately war was declared in 1939 the whole of the knowledge and experience was put at the disposal of the Ministry of Fuel and Power, Service and Supply Departments . Its trained scientists and technicians dealt ably and enthusiastically with the many items of special work which were undertaken. The Fuel Research organisation had accumulated a fund of experience and information on fuels of all kinds.

War work included the development of gas producers, using anthracite and coke to replace petrol for road vehicles.They made hydrogen for barrage  balloons contributing  sufficient to fill completely more than 11,000. The problem of the smoke emitted from ships’ convoys was vigorously attacked, and as a result of intensive research  a smoke eliminating device was designed and developed at Greenwich. Other activitied included the devising and development of incendiary weapons. Some Commonwealth countries  were worried  that their sources of oil were American and asked for support and help in developing their coal industries in a reasonable and economic fashion.

After the war, at the 1948 Olympics., the torch carried eventually to Mount Olympus was designed and., along with the fuel used,  at the Greenwich laboratories. Nearer home in 1949 they were involved in work with the East Malling fruit research organisation to find a method of heating to save fruit from early frosts.

On 20^th March  1952 – only a month after his wife had become Queen – Prince Philip visited.  He was described as a ‘good looking young man who  drove his large Austin through the streets of Greenwich.’  He watched experiments on smoke elimination and combustion of pulverised coal.  In the domestic heating section he looked at currrent research.  He watched work on making oil from coal by synthetic processes. He talked to many workers - like Charles Guest of Charlton, the longest serving blacksmith and with Audrey French who was examining moisture content in fuel.

I could go on anf]d on about all the various inventions and developments which happened here and the subject really needs a proper analysis and an extended essay.  I’ve hardly touched on the work they did here here in Greenwich. The organisation was closed down in the mid 50s and the laboratory and all the experts were moved to Warren Springs site and it has been reorganised more than once since. Their bibliography, published in 1945, lists over 600 published reports and papers.