Note 53 — Chapter VIII · CARBON AND THE HYDROCARBONS

This is a so-called intermediate oil (between kerosene and lubricating oils), solar oil, or pyronaphtha. Lamps are already being manufactured for burning it but still require improvement. Above all, however, it requires a more extended market, and this at present is wanting, owing to the two following reasons: (1) Those products of the American petroleum which are the most widely spread and almost universally consumed contain but little of this intermediate oil, and what there is is divided between the kerosene and the lubricating oils; (2) the Baku naphtha, which is capable of yielding a great deal (up to 30 p.c.) of intermediate oil, is produced in enormous quantities, about 300 million poods, but has no regular markets abroad, and for the consumption in Russia (about 25 million poods of kerosene per annum) and for the limited export (60 million poods per annum) into Western Europe (by the Trans-Caucasian Railway) those volatile and more dangerous parts of the naphtha which enter into the composition of the American petroleum are sufficient, although Baku naphtha yields about 25 p.c. of such kerosene. For this reason pyronaphtha is not manufactured in sufficient quantities, and the whole world is consuming the unsafe kerosene. When a pipe line has been laid from Baku to the Black Sea (in America there are many which carry the raw naphtha to the sea-shore, where it is made into kerosene and other products) then the whole mass of the Baku naphtha will furnish safe illuminating oils, which without doubt will find an immense application. A mixture of the intermediate oil with kerosene or Baku oil (specific gravity 0·84 to 0·85) may be considered (on removing the benzoline) to be the best illuminating oil, because it is safe (flashing point from 40° to 60°), cheaper (Baku naphtha gives as much as 60 p.c. of Baku oil), and burns perfectly well in lamps differing but little from those made for burning American kerosene (unsafe, flashing point 20° to 30°).