Russell Lands has been a world leader in constructing wood residue-powered boiler plants. Each installation was designed specifically to replace oil consumption. Forest product residue is renewable and, in many cases, is of a negative value.

 

In 1957, Russell Lands submitted a feasibility study to a Fortune 500 textile corporation, proposing the installation of a wood-fired boiler plant to replace oil consumption. The proposal guaranteed the corporation a 4-year supply of wood fuel at a fixed price--the equivalent of $0.14 per gallon of oil.

 

This resulted in the construction of the first non-forest-products-industry wood-fired boiler plant in the United States in modern times.

 

The resulting boiler plant, which supplies processed steam for the manufacturing of textile goods, burned 125,000 tons of sawmill residues per year, resulting in annual savings of more than 6,000,000 gallons of fuel oil.

 

The price of oil quickly soared that year from $0.17 to $0.70 per gallon, and the project was an immediate success. Two more boiler plants followed in other states with long-term contracts for supplying wood residue fuel.

 

Russell Lands has supplied over 6 million tons of wood fuel to the three steam plants. This was accomplished without the cutting of one additional tree by using sawmill and forest residue. The use of this waste wood has saved the consumption of the equivalent of 250 million gallons of oil.

 

Russell Lands, Inc. – ECON continued research in wood energy after the boiler plant stage. This work was more of a proof-of-concept project than an attempt to significantly reduce oil consumption.

 

Observing a wood fire, it is obvious that some spurts of gases and some smoke will turn to flames. This tells us that wood burned under controlled circumstances will produce gases or smoke that will burn.

 

Such a devise, when used to control or limit the intake of air, is known as a gasifier.

 

Contrary to normal logic, a common internal combustion engine can be “forced” to burn this “fuel.”

 

ECON employed a much-used, old-model pickup for ECAR no. 1. The gasifier, about the size of a 50 gal. drum, was carried in the bed. The carburetor was removed, and a metal box installed to mix the gas with the proper amount of air; and away we go.

 

About 1.25 lbs. of small, dry, solid wood blocks are required per mile.

 

Nothing about this procedure is simple; the smoke must be cooled, dried and filtered. Only a labor of love will succeed here.

 

All in all, however, it does work. An ECON crew did make a gasifier trip from Jacksonville, Florida to Los Angeles and another from Key West to Campobello, Canada.

 

No gasoline or commercial fuel was allowed on the trip, and the gasifier was restarted cold each day--a major feat.

 

No practical application is claimed, yet it cannot be denied that if fossil fuel were ever rationed to the point that no recreational travel was possible, an alternative solution is available.