Plausibility check: to what extent could WW2 Japan have relied on synthetic fuels?

Hendryk

Banned
Note that I am not phrasing this as "Could WW2 Japan have relied on synthetic fuels?" The question is to what extent a synthetic fuel program could have alleviated Japanese fuel needs.

Could Japan have acquired by 1941 or so the capability to produce synthetic fuels in industrially meaningful amounts? In OTL Japanese efforts to produce synthetic fuels were an utter failure. Here I'm assuming an earlier German-Japanese cooperation with Germany sharing its production methods, especially the Fischer-Tropsch and Bergius (a.k.a. hydrogenation) processes. How complex are those and how developed a chemical industry would they require?

Here's the abstract of Synthetic fuel production in prewar and world war II Japan: A case study in technological failure by Anthony N. Stranges:

Japan is a country largely lacking supplies of many essential natural resources including petroleum, coal, and iron ore. As her industrial base and economy expanded during the 1920s and 1930s, Japan's dependence on imports of these resources became increasingly evident. The onset of the Depression in the 1930s further threatened Japan's lifeline, and, in an effort to become economically independent and self-sufficient in natural resources (autarky), Japan's militaristic government pursued a policy of territorial expansion. Beginning in 1937, Japan's military forces swept out of Manchuria into China and then into Southeast Asia in search of strategic materials such as petroleum, coal, copper, zinc, and rubber. To achieve independence in petroleum, the Japanese developed a dual approach: they would acquire natural petroleum sources in Southeast Asia and at the same time establish a synthetic fuel industry for the conversion of coal to oil. Actually, the Japanese had begun research on synthetic fuel in the 1920s, only a few years after other countries, such as Germany and Britain, that lacked sources of natural petroleum. They did excellent laboratory research on the coal hydrogenation and Fischer-Tropsch conversion processes, but in their haste to construct large synthetic fuel plants they bypassed the intermediated pilot-plant stage and failed to make a successful transition from small- to large-scale production. Unable to synthesize liquid fuels from coal, they instead derived significant quantities from the technologically simpler coal carbonization and shale oil distillation processes. In the last year of World War II, the Japanese attempted to revive their synthetic fuel industry and entered into an agreement with IG Farben for technical assistance. Germany's defeat ended this final effort. The Japanese synthetic fuel industry presents a good case study of technological failure. It shows that high-quality basic scientific research does not necessarily translate into large-scale technological success.
So, my question is: how can Japan do better in that field?
 
Hendryk,

I see two issues at work here: production and transport.

First, Japan must not try to bypass the intermediate pilot-plant stage as Stranges points out. There are many PODs that could accomplish the earlier, more focused effort you require.

Second, Japan needs to be able to transport the synthetic fuels from their production sites to the points where they will be used. It seems odd, but this issue is actually the more important of the two.

Japan's logistic capabilities are abysmal when compared to the other powers. She didn't have enough shipping, she couldn't build enough shipping, and she didn't seize enough shipping to really support her conquests. Everything was being run on a shoestring because Japan's sealift capacity could only move shoestrings.

For example, check out this article at CombinedFleet. The author makes a pretty good case for fuel oil concerns severely limiting the use of IJN battleships and other surface craft in the Solomons during the Guadacanal campaign. That is, in 1942 before her merchant shipping losses had even began, Japan couldn't both produce and deliver enough bunker fuel from the DEI to Truk so that her battleline could shoot up Henderson Field more often. As the author writes in his summary; The solution to Japan's dilemna, of course, was embodied in neither battleships nor the sleek destroyers of the Tokyo Express, but rather in the chunky hulls of humble cargo ships.

Unless Japan can ship synthetic fuel from her plants to where it is consumed it really doesn't matter how much synthetic fuel she makes.


Bill
 
Hendryk,

One point I forgot in my earlier rambling nonsense; aviation gas.

Assuming the synthetic fuel plants are relatively near the Empire's major coal deposits, we're looking at Hokkaido and Manchuria. The Home Islands may then have a slightly more robust air defense as a result.

With more IJN/IJA planes in the air, LeMay may be less inclined to begin the massive low level incendiary attacks on cities in the Home Islands. In order to increase bomb loads, LeMay ordered the removal of most the defensive armaments, ammo, and gunners aboard his B-29s.

I still think LeMay will burn Japan down. He'll just be forced to do it from greater altitudes with smaller incendiary loads.


Bill
 
Japan is a country largely lacking supplies of many essential natural resources including petroleum, coal, and iron ore
To make Synthetic Fuel, You need something to make it from.
Usually this is Coal, sometimes Oil Shale or Oil Sands.
So unless Japan is going for Alcohol or Hydrogen, Japan doesn't have either the petrol, or the Coal to Synthesize a substitute.
 
To make Synthetic Fuel, You need something to make it from.
Usually this is Coal, sometimes Oil Shale or Oil Sands.
So unless Japan is going for Alcohol or Hydrogen, Japan doesn't have either the petrol, or the Coal to Synthesize a substitute.
Japan had lots of coal in her earlier conquered territories.
 
The go would be to make synthetic fuel in Manchuko so the shipping problem is aleviated because the fuel, or semi-processed products needs only to be shipped 200km or so from Pusan to Japan. This would supply Japan proper with some of its fuel needs and the deployed forces could rely on the fuel of SEA, as happened IOTL. So when the Phillipines were invaded the home islands would have a local fuel supply and the forces in Sigapore would as well.

As nice as this sounds it won't mean much when stacked against the power of the USN/USAAF.
 
Japan cannot rely on coal conversion. In fact the Germans found out their coal conversion plants were very vulnerable to attack. It would help to have them, but its not a dependable solution.

Ethanol production is much more survivable because its just a distillery and can be dispersed all over. The problem is the Japanese will have less to eat and their caloric intake had already shrink to below sustainable levels by the time fuel was in short supply.

During the war the Japanese dug up pine trees to turn their roots into aviation gas. But one tree was only good for one minute of flight.

They could however use more biodiesel for non-aviation purposes and free up more gasoline. The Chinese at this time converted tung oil into biodiesel and this proved to be excellent. If the Japanese can grow sufficient tung trees where it doesn't compete for farm land this may be workable.
 
Was Manchuko subject to many attack throughut the war? I'd have thought that it was pretty safe as far as these things go, Japan itself wasn't bombed until late in the war.
 
Was Manchuko subject to many attack throughut the war? I'd have thought that it was pretty safe as far as these things go, Japan itself wasn't bombed until late in the war.

B-29s first bombed Japan from bases in China but this proved uneconomical. Surely a narrow objective mission such as this would be carried out despite cost. Also Manchuria may be close enough for B-24s to take out from Chinese bases.
 
This might actually mean that Manchukuo has better air defenses than the home islands. It probably wouldn't make a bit of difference once the USSR attacked, though. Maybe the Soviets take a few dozen more casualties and need a couple more days to overrun everything.
 
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