MOLASSES 453 



Manufacture of Alcohol. — In the West Indies, Argentina, Peru, Natal 

 and Australia the distillery forms an integral part of the sugar factory and 

 large quantities of a potable spirit known as rum are manufactured. As 

 the sale of alcohol leaves all the fertilizing elements available for their return 

 to the soil, this is perhaps the most rational scheme. Market limitations 

 are, however, a factor that prevent the more extended use of molasses in 

 this way. Eventually, however, a more extended field may be afforded 

 by the growing use of alcohol as fuel and in the arts. 



Use as Fuel. — Molasses is occasionally used as fuel in combination with 

 the bagasse. The large amount of ash formed on combustion is, however, 

 a troublesome factor. During the potash shortage in the Great War a number 

 of Hawaiian factories installed special furnaces to both burn the molasses 

 and to recover the potash. The design included a storage tank set in the 

 brickwork of the furnace in which the molasses was sufficiently heated to 

 allow it to flow freely to the hearth, on which it was burnt under a fire-tube 

 boiler. The flues were made of wide cross-section to allow of the deposit 

 of potash carried forward in a volatile form. 



Return to Soil. — This method of disposal, which is of all perhaps the 

 most rational, is discussed at length in Chapter V. 



REFERENCES IN CHAPTER XXII. 



" Cane Sugar and its Manufacture," Manchester, 1909. 



H.S.P.A. Ex. Sta., Agric. Ser., Bull. 28. 



S.C., 1893, 25, 284 ; 1896, 28, 311. 



Int. Sug. Jour., 191 7, 19, 218. 



Ann. Ckitn. Phys., 67, 113 ; 73, 103. 



Jour. Prak. Chem., 26, 468. 



U.K. patent 656 of 1859. 



U.K. patent 3865 of 1877. 



U.K. patent 54 of 1867 ; 3093 of 1893. 



U.K. patent 331 of 1881 ; 398 of 1882. 



U.K. patent 2239 of 1882. 



U.K. patent 967 of 1883. 



U.K. patent 2416 of 1883. 



U.K. patent 22859 of 1895 ; 6733 of 1900. 



I^.K. patent 14925 of 1895 ; 23171 of 1895. 



U.K. patent 2053 of 1863 ; 8502 of 1884 ; 9243 of 188 



U.K. patent 1254 of 1867 ; 164 of 1869. 



U.K. patent 1817 of 1882. 



Haw. Plant. Man., Sept., 1905. 



La. Plant., 34, 236. 



