Gently, in the northernmost part of Jiangyang County, a place called Mountainside Town, it suddenly became slightly turbulent. For further north from here, there is an arched mountain beam, which makes the river narrower and deeper. After that mountain beam, it belongs to Han'an County in the north.

The townships and towns on the border between the two counties are often places with poor transportation conditions and natural environment, and they are also relatively poor. Most of the people have never seen the world.

Wang Yang is the eldest son of a saltworks family in this town, and he has a well of his own, as well as two wells managed by the government, and is considered a rich local man. So on this day, he was suggesting that at the dock, he saw that there was a fleet of ships sent by the government to the town, and he immediately became keenly aware of the problem and hurriedly went to inform his father.

The Eastern Han Dynasty followed the policy of "salt and iron official camp" since the Western Han Dynasty Sanghongyang, and private salt was of course prohibited from legal point of view. However, in remote areas, in order to balance production efficiency and management costs, the government generally allows the coexistence of the government and the private sector during the salt extraction stage.

As long as the salt dug from private wells is sold to the government for underwriting, and not sold on its own, it is not a crime. This also makes it easier for the government to grasp the big and let go of the small, grasp the circulation and not the production, stimulate the people to be more enthusiastic in the production process, and take the initiative to find ways to improve technology and improve production efficiency.

"Ah Weng, come and see, a big official has come to our town, and he is here to see Yanjing. At most, we have come here with the county order, and Taishou has never seen it. The person who came was very young, but he was more pompous than Taishou, and I heard that he was accompanied by Chen Taishou. Wang Yang roared and pulled his father, who was still in the house with mash, up.

"Be calm for Nayon! Fuss. How can there be an official who is bigger than Taishou to come to us? Even if there is, isn't it going to increase the salt water again, or to lower the price of the government's purchases? It's not a good thing. But I haven't heard that there is a price reduction in Jiangyang, how can it be aimed at our poor and remote place. His father Wang Jiang said as he slapped the back of Wang Yang's hand with a bamboo chopstick, admonishing his son to be calm, and then dusted off his coarse cloth coat and got up.

As soon as the two of them walked out, they saw Xu An, the old man in the town, also rushing to Wang Jiang's well field with a few shopkeepers, and grabbed Wang Jiang's sleeve as soon as they met:

"Brother Wang, I remember that the two official wells in charge of your family will be angry? Chen Taishou has just arrived in town? What about sitting in my room and asking about this? Come back with me! I heard that the governor is coming. ”

The "village elders" of the Eastern Han Dynasty were not just the title of "respected elders in the countryside", but the subordinate officials of the county officials? There are also those called "three elders"? In fact, it is equal to the head of the township. Rank 100 stones, in fact, receive eight stone grains of millet every month? Ninety-six stones a year.

This is equivalent to a township chief who met the mayor of a prefecture-level city (Taishou) and suddenly came to inspect, and brought a governor who was higher than Taishou? How can you not pay attention to it.

Wang Jiang heard that such a big official? secretly complained, thinking that he was going to be robbed of the people's fat and ointment, and he was very puzzled why such a big official came to such a poor and remote place to search.

You can't blame these people for not being knowledgeable, after all, they have never been out of the county in their lives? Don't even know who the world is outside? Liu Yan died last year and was replaced by Liu Bei, they didn't know, they only knew that the county order and Taishou on their heads had not been replaced-who let Chen Shi surrender to Zhao Yun without fighting, so that the people under his rule did not go through the war, and the officials were retained? I don't know if I change my master, and I should live my life as usual.

……

Wang Jiang was embarrassed by Xu An's comprehension of the old man's mansion? Li Su was already waiting there to prepare for interrogation, and Chen Shi and Guoyuan were sitting next to him.

Of course, the old house is very dilapidated? It's an adobe house, only the main house is covered with tiles? Are the courtyard walls and transepts tiled? Just straw to cover the roof.

Chen Shi flattered people to fan Li Su? also specially asked a servant woman to hold a banana leaf fan on the top of Li Su's head, so as not to let the mud on the roof fall and dirty Li Su's hair.

Li Su's reputation for taking a bath is well known to everyone in Yizhou officialdom, and looking at Li Su's clothes and hair, he also knows that he is much cleaner than others. People like Chen Shi, who surrendered and kept his official position, had to be more and more careful.

"The governor, this Wang Jiang, has two fire and gas official wells hosted by the county at home." Villager Xu An knelt down first and replied. He usually doesn't have to kneel when he sees a county official, and he doesn't pay much attention to it, but today the level difference is too big, and he has no bottom in his heart.

"Get up and speak, I ask you, how deep are these two wells that come out of the fire? How much is the production? Is it possible to boil salt over fire? Li Su asked kindly.

He actually didn't have much expectations for the last question, because the history of boiling salt with natural gas in Shu seems to be after Zhuge Liang ruled Shu, but the use of natural gas in Yunnan seems to be earlier, and it was recorded in the Eastern Han Dynasty, but Li Su can't remember it clearly.

If the people don't understand, he just teaches.

When Wang Jiang heard that it was not to loot and reduce the price, but to question the output, he breathed a sigh of relief, and hurriedly replaced the prepared words of complaint and begging for mercy with a set of words that "emphasized technical difficulties":

"Governor, let's be wronged, it's not that we don't work hard to mine the official well, it's really that these two official wells can't be drilled deeper anymore - those who have opened salt wells know that the deeper the salt well, the better the brine, but the well with fire gas, as long as the fire gas, can no longer dig deeper, and the mining must be more careful.

I'm not talking nonsense, more than 20 years ago, when my father was in charge of those wells, that is, when he was digging deep to extract brine, he fainted by the well, and when we found it, half an hour had passed, and we couldn't save it when we pulled it aside. If this fire is not burned, it will poison people if it gathers in one place. As for boiling salt with fire, we don't dare to think about it, we only dare to burn some scattered poison when the fire is too much. ”

When Li Su heard this result, he was quite relieved, it turned out that the Gongjing area had already hit a sufficient depth to stabilize the gas, and he did not continue to dig only because the people were afraid of poison, not because the excavation technology was not enough.

If the drilling technology is too weak, Li Su will not be able to open it, after all, he is not studying at the University of Petroleum, and he can't develop a bullish drill bit.

But the people are psychologically unprepared and afraid, so there is a place for him as a liberal arts student.

As for the poisonous fire gas mentioned by Wang Jiang, Li Su estimated that the methane concentration was too high and caused suffocation - low concentrations of natural gas (methane) have no obvious toxic effect on the human body, and when there are several percent of methane in the air, it will cause headache, dizziness and fatigue.

The real poisoning effect is coal gas (carbon monoxide), not natural gas.

Li Su shook his head and sighed: "It's a pity, that's because you don't understand, so you can't destroy the heavenly things - these fires can be directly and stably made to make fires and boil salt, and after all the fires are burned, it will not be good and evil, and it will not be breathless for people and animals." But it's not too late, Chen Taishou, let's start supervising the rectification today. ”

The second half of Li Su's sentence was said to Chen Shi.

Hearing this, Wang Jiang hurriedly dissuaded: "Governor, it's not so easy, when the gas is burned, there is a fire at the wellhead, how to make brine?" We can't get angry? I've only heard of the predecessors in Qiongxian County, who opened the wellhead wide, and occasionally lit a fire to disperse gas, but I really haven't heard of burning a fire while pumping brine, and you have to cut firewood to boil salt. ”

Li Suyi waved his hand: "Stupid!" You don't get some pipes, drill side holes next to the brine well, and direct the gas to a distant place next to it and burn it again, then you can't continue to use it. Cut the nonsense and go to the scene to see. ”

He didn't bother to reason directly with the foolish people, these people only have operating skills, but they don't have basic scientific knowledge.

A group of people have been mixed to the scene, found a well with associated natural gas to try it, at first could not find the material to make gas pipes, after some tinkering, Li Su ordered to try with a bamboo tube, but the test effect was not good, because the bamboo leaked, the flames leaked out and burned everywhere, fortunately there was no big danger, and it was not enough to cause a gas explosion-

The gas output of this well is very low, the natural gas density is low and the escape is relatively fast, as long as it is not a confined space, it is not guided and not stored, it will not reach the explosive concentration.

This is also determined by the physical characteristics of natural gas, which is really easy to explode, because the average density molecular weight of air is 29, (nitrogen 28 oxygen 32, according to the average concentration of 29), and methane molecular weight is only 16, much lighter than air, it is easy to rise and drift away. The gas is carbon monoxide with a molecular weight of 28, which is too close to the 29 of the air to be easily mixed with the air.

Although the experiment failed, there was a foundation for the experiment, and everyone had a somewhat intuitive understanding of the operation process of "natural gas boiling salt", and they were also quite inspired.

Guoyuan, who had been in charge of Tuntian in Zhuti for more than half a year, finally had a flash of inspiration, thought of a question, and took the initiative to admonish: "Dudu, I know what's going on - when I was in Zhuti, I inquired about the business travel information from Nanlai, and I heard that there are also a small number of salt wells in Nanzhong, which also bring fire, and some of them use fire to cook salt.

They must have burned it with bamboo tubes, but the Qiongzhu in Nanzhong was much taller than the bamboo in Qianwei County—didn't the lord reward the Qiongzhu cane, which was a specialty of Nanzhong? A cane is seven or eight feet long, and it can be made from a single piece of bamboo. And I heard that the thickest bamboo in the south has one or two zhang per energy. Therefore, their airway joints are less than ours, and there are fewer air leaks than ours, so that salt can be boiled! ”

Li Su listened, pondered for a while, was overjoyed, and patted Guoyuan's shoulder again and again: "Zini! I didn't expect you to think about this, as a reward! In the end, you did things with your heart, after leveling Nanzhong, I asked the lord to promote you to the captain of the agricultural school. ”

It turns out that the technical level of Nanzhong people is obviously worse than that of Shu people, but Nanzhong people can use a small amount of gas to cook salt, because their gas pipeline is well sealed!

The habits of bamboo in most areas are relatively close to herbaceous plants, one year old and one withering, so it is difficult to grow to a particularly thick length and a particularly wide spacing between bamboo nodes.

However, because it is too hot in Yunnan and there is no winter, some of the Qiongzhu that grows in the tropics will survive the winter and not die. Perennial bamboo has a huge advantage over annual bamboo compared to annual bamboo slub length.

The biggest problem with using bamboo as a gas pipeline is to cut the bamboo first and cut off the bamboo joints, so that the gas can flow through, but the more interfaces are cut, the more air leaks there are.

After understanding this problem, Li Su's first reaction was to deal with it with two measures: first, after conquering Nanzhong, he would add a "perennial bamboo with thick bamboo knots" to the trade materials of Nanzhong.

Secondly, at present, if you can't get so much bamboo in the south and middle, first find a way to solve the problem of "not cutting the bamboo, but directly drilling and breaking the bamboo", or develop how to reseal and connect the bamboo that has been cut and knotted.

Nowadays, there is no electrical tape, no rubber, not even ordinary airtight tape paper, and we have to find a way to get other sealing materials.

Moreover, as long as the gas pipeline is done well, the scale of natural gas boiling salt will be much stronger than the current small fight of "one well can only burn one pot" of the people in Nanzhong.

As long as there is the technology to erect a gas pipeline that is more than ten zhang away and does not leak, Li Su can continue to dig the associated gas well, multiply the gas output, and then build a salt boiling factory with dozens of pots on the gas port, and use the gas pipeline to divide the gas to the bottom of so many pots to burn.

Even if a well doesn't have so much brine for you to boil, then lay a "tap brine pipe" to bring the brine from other wells in the same township, and use the gas from the gas well to boil the brine of the whole township.

"I didn't expect to return to the end of the Han Dynasty and have to deal with water pipes and gas pipes again. It seems that in the future, the evaluation of me, the bathing marquis, in the history books, will be sprayed like the 'water supply and drainage emperor' of Emperor Ling.

Alas, there is no way, if the natural gas production is too large after deep digging, all the nearby salt wells will not be enough to boil. When the time comes, you will open a natural gas hot spring bath nearby, and don't waste the extra gas. ”