Methyl Alcohol
Not since Prohibition has there been so much interest in the local making of alcohol. This time around, the objective is more noble, the main desire being to produce an economically feasible replacement for petroleum.
The chemically most simple alcohol useful for fuel is methyl alcohol, also called methanol or wood alcohol. Since 1930, most methyl alcohol has been made by chemically combining carbon monoxide and hydrogen. One molecule of CO plus two molecules of H 2 gas yields methanol. Its formula is written CH 3 OH.
From the time methyl alcohol was discovered in 1661 until people learned to synthesize it, about sixty years ago, methyl alcohol was obtained by destructively distilling wood, that is, by breaking up the wood fiber with heat and driving off the volatile components. Interest in going back to that method is growing among people who live in the forest regions of western Canada and Alaska because it is recognized that methanol production might be a profitable use of sawdust and other forestry wastes. Wood contains, by weight, roughly two percent methyl alcohol, so a ton of wood will yield about 24 liters (6 gallons) of methyl alcohol.
One source claims a single cord of pitch pine will yield 50 bushels of charcoal, 1000 cubic feet of methane gas, 50 gallons of a burnable mixture of oil and tar, 1.5 barrels of pitch, 20 gallons of turpentine, 1 barrel of tar, and 100 gallons of a gooey mixture of acetic acid and methyl alcohol, in addition to 5 gallons of pure methyl alcohol. So wood can produce a variety of useful substances.
Once the poisonous methyl alcohol and other materials have been distilled off, the remaining cellulose-rich wood fiber can be fed to sheep and beef cattle. Canadian scientists have found that a feed composed of barley or corn mixed with 30 to 50 percent cooked aspen chips is satisfactory. They did not comment on the taste of the mixture.
