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I.C.I pertol

B

Bill Parker

master brummie
Does anyone remember that short lived branding from ICI? I believe it was made from coal, it definitaly has quite a distinctive smell that of coal gas rather than petroleum.

Im not exactly sure when it was marketed from what I remember it was late 60s to early-mid 70s. if it was made from coal does anyone know how this was carried out?

I wonder if ICI just took the tar/liquor from gas works and distilled it or was the process using raw coal?.Also was it the demise of the coal industry responsible for its dissapearance along with the introduction of natural(methane) gas?

Remember when every gas appliance had to have a sort of governor fitted? A company called "Servotomic" undertook these conversions at my parents home, I think this was a division of GKN, unless someone here can correct me.
 
I'm not sure of this, but I had understood that the petrol was a by product of chemical manufacture, and i had thought it had originated in from oil. ICI took the components from the crude oil they required for manufacturing the chemicals and were left with a mixture which (possibly after reforming to get the right
properties) was sold as petrol. On the other hand it might have been that they reacted coal with hydrogen to get a crude mixture, took out what they wanted, and
then (as above) sold the rest as petrol. Certainly it is (relatively) easy, if expensive , to make petrol from coal by this process. The Germans did it in the war, as did the South Africans when there were embargoes against them. It would have been too expensive to carry out the process just to make petrol - the main purpose would have to have been as a source of something else, with the petrol as a by product.
I'm not sure, but i think the business they developed was taken over by another firm - cant remember which though
mike
 
Hi Mike, thanks for responding and of course realising I ment Petrol and not "pertol" having said that do you think I should register the "pertol" name? I might make a fortune!
It was a long time ago and I think someone told me it was made from coal but this was probably wrong, it definitely had a different aroma to conventional oil derived petroleum, not that I go around sniffing the stuff.
 
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