16 



ENCYCLOPEDIA OF PRACTICAL HORTICULTURE 



distillery. In case the distiller intends 

 to denature this product on the distillery 

 premises, he is obliged also to furnish 

 this room with the following apparatus: 

 A weighing tank, which is to be used 

 for gauging alcohol and for no other pur- 

 pose; tanks for the storage of approved 

 denaturants; sealed measures, for use 

 with the denaturants: a mixing tank, and, 

 if desired, tanks for the storage of de- 

 natured alcohol. The labor required in 

 denaturing is furnished by the distiller 

 and his employees, but is carried on un- 

 der the supervision of a United States 

 ganger assigned for this purpose and in 

 his presence. 



Materials Which May Serve As Sources 



of Alcohol 



General Considerations 



The first essential in the character of 

 a material which is to serve as a source 

 of alcohol is that it shall contain either 

 fermentable sugar or some component 

 which can be transformed readily into a 

 fermentable sugar. This is absolutely 

 necessary, as without sugar no alcohol 

 can be produced. A second essential is 

 that the proportion of sugar, or its equiv- 

 alent, in the proposed raw material, shall 

 be sufficient to pay for handling the latter. 

 This is very important, for there are 

 many saccharine materials, such as to- 

 matoes and unripe watermelons, the juices 

 of which contain so small a percentage 

 of sugar that all the alcohol obtained 

 would be insufficient to pay for the mere 

 cost of handling. A third requisite is 

 that there shall be an abundant, concen- 

 trated, and stable supply of the mate- 

 rial. Abundance is an essential, because 

 even a small distillery will use a large 

 amount of material daily. Thus, a plant 

 having an approximate daily capacity of 

 100 gallons, or two barrels of denatured 

 alcohol, will consume the following 

 amounts of raw material: Two hundred 

 gallons of rich molasses; or one ton of 

 shelled corn; or four tons of potatoes, 

 containing about 15 per cent of starch: 

 or seven to eight tons of sweet apples, 

 containing about 12 per cent of sugar. 

 A concentrated supply of material is nec- 

 essary for if it be scattered over a wide 

 area and must be gathered by hand, the 



cost for labor becomes prohibitive. The 

 supply must be constant, for it does not 

 pay to build a factory that can be run 

 only at intervals. For example, ripe 

 peaches would undoubtedly be worth dis- 

 tilling in localities where they are grown 

 abundantl.v and where there are surplus 

 crop's, if it were not for the fact that 

 there may not be a surplus more than 

 two years out of five, and that the crop 

 would have to be worked up within the 

 short space of two or three weeks to keep 

 it from spoiling. No distillery could earn 

 the interest on its investment running 

 two months out of five years. 



In addition to the points enumerated, 

 other considerations present themselves: 

 Whether the material in question will 

 stand transportation and storage; whether 

 it can be worked with appliances which 

 are to be obtained readily in this coun- 

 try; whether it can be handled by the 

 machinery which is adapted to the bulk 

 of the available material in any given re- 

 gion, or must have special machinery in- 

 stalled to fit it for fermentation, 

 whether it possibly may yield a greater 

 profit if used for some other purpose than 

 distilling, and so on. 



Chemical Composition of Fermentable 

 Materials 



Knowledge of the chemical composition 

 of a proposed raw material is always es- 

 sential in determining its availability 

 as a source of alcohol. The proportion of 

 sugar or other fermentable substance 

 which may be present has been men- 

 tioned already as being of prime impor- 

 tance. In addition thereto the percen- 

 tages of water, ash, crude fiber, and ni- 

 trogenous compounds or proteids will al- 

 ways be of interest since the proportions 

 of these components will determine the 

 manner in which a material must be 

 worked. The fat percentage has little in- 

 terest for a distiller, save perhaps as it 

 may affect the feeding value of the dis- 

 tillery refuse; but it will be stated when- 

 ever possible, for the sake of complete- 

 ness, in such analyses as are given. It 

 may be said in this connection that the 

 five components just mentioned — water, 

 ash, fiber, proteids, and fat — are always 

 determined and reported as such, but. un- 



