Left out in the cold

摘要

Starting in the 1960s, a flat-capped army of gasfitters fanned out across Britain to convert a network that used so-called town gas, a mixture of hydrogen, carbon monoxide and other gases, to one based on natural gas, recently discovered under the North Sea. The operation was meticulously planned to avoid stranding customers without heat, and avoiding gas leaks and explosions. Natural gas is less toxic than town gas, which is derived from coal, so the potential benefits were huge, not least that the suicide rate fell as fewer people gassed themselves with their ovens.