206 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS 



of this sum is expended for a single item and goes to a single country 

 Chile. Further, nearly all the nitrogen contained in the lists of more 

 valuable nitrogenous compounds is derived from Chile saltpeter, 

 exported to European countries, chiefly Germany. The fact that the 

 United States, in common with all civilized countries, is so dependent 

 upon this one source, and the additional fact that the deposits of 

 nitrate in Chile are not particularly extensive and are destined 

 at an early date to complete exhaustion, constitute the nitrogen 

 problem. 



The efforts that are being made to release the manufacturing and 

 agricultural interests of the world from this dependence assumes an 

 increasing importance each day. The most decided progress is being 

 made by the chemists in Germany, Scandinavia, France, Switzerland, 

 and Austria. Attempts to bring about a direct union between hydro- 

 gen and nitrogen were made at an early date by Renault in 1846. 

 Professor F. Habber, of Carlsruhe, with the aid of G. Van Oordt, 

 published in 1905 and 1906 a series of papers in which the general 

 conditions for a successful solution were clearly denned. Professor 

 Habber's process has come under the contrc/i of the Badische Anilin- 

 und Sodafabrik of Ludwigshafen, the leading chemical company in 

 Germany, which is 'devoting particular attention to the solution of 

 the nitrogen question. It is actively engaged in perfecting this syn- 

 thetic process so as to have it ready for technical purposes when the 

 "psychological moment" arrives. 



Nitrogen is now supplied for industrial purposes by the Linde, 

 Pictet, Claude, and other methods at exceedingly low rates. In 

 France prices range from two to ten centimes per kilo (0.18 to 0.9 

 cent per pound). In Germany three pfennigs per kilo (0.32 cent 

 per pound) is not an uncommon rate. Herr Linde states that his 

 smaller machines yielding one hundred cubic meters per hour (cubic 

 meter = 35.3i4 cu. ft.) can supply 99.5 per cent nitrogen (0.5 per 

 cent oxygen) for six pfennigs per cubic meter (1.25 kilo), or 0.648 

 cent per pound. Very large plants can produce the gas somewhat 

 more cheaply. It is probable that the owners of the Habber patents 

 have it in their power to produce ammonia, and hence ammonia com- 

 pounds, profitably at prices far below those which these substances 

 now command in the world's markets. As ammonium sulphate, the 

 dominant member of the group, is used almost exclusively as a fer- 

 tili/cr, and as ammonia is exclusively a by-product of the distillation 

 and coking of coal, etc., its price is controlled almost entirely at prrsi-nt 



