LEAKAGE.--Broadly speaking, it may be said that the commercial success of
any village acetylene-supply--if not that of all large installations--
depends upon the leakage being kept within moderate limits. It follows
from what was stated in Chapter VI. about the diffusion of acetylene,
that from pipes of equal porosity acetylene and coal-gas will escape at
equal rates when the effective pressure in the pipe containing acetylene
is double that in the pipe containing coal-gas. The loss of coal-gas by
leakage is seldom less than 5 per cent. of the volume passed into the
main at the works; and provided a village main delivering acetylene is
not unduly long in proportion to the consumption of gas--or, in other
words, provided the district through which an acetylene distributing main
passes is not too sparsely populated--the loss of acetylene should not
exceed the same figure. Caro holds that the loss of gas by leakage from a
village installation should be quoted in absolute figures and not as a
percentage of the total make as indicated by the works meter, because
that total make varies so largely at different periods of the year, while
the factors which determine the magnitude of the leakage are always
identical; and therefore whereas the actual loss of gas remains the same,
it is represented to be more serious in the summer than in the winter.
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