leye) 
O. Carter, of the U.S. Navy. It was not known at that 
time that the British Government, through Prof. J. C. 
McLennan, of the University of Toronto, was carrying 
out experimental work with the same object in view in 
Canada. 
The U.S. Government had the active co-operation of 
the Linde Company, the Air Reduction Company, and 
the Jefferies-Norton Company, and the engineers of the 
first two companies actually operated their plants. 
Whatever success was achieved in the commercial 

SH, Narwalk ae (4s 
oe eres 
NA TORE 
[ JANUARY 20, 1923 

some helium. On May 13 some gas of a grade between 
60 and 70 per cent. helium was produced. The opera- 
tions of Plant 2, however, were not as a whole so 
successful as those of Plant 1. - 
Plant No. 3, using the Jefferies-Norton process, 
started operations in the late fall of r918. It was hoped 
that this plant would show some economies which 
could not be hoped for from the other two more or 
less standardised processes. Whereas helium was pro- 
duced at various times by Plant No. 3, it was never 

Fic. 3.—Compressors for experimental work in Cryogenic Laboratory, U.S. Bureau of Mines. 
production of helium was to a very considerable extent 
due to the ability of the engineers of the companies 
mentioned. 
Plant No. x (Fig. 2), using the Linde process, com- 
menced to work on March 6, 1918, and made its first 
helium on April 8, r918, when some gas analysing 27 per 
cent. helium was obtained. This purity was increased 
after a few months until in the early part of July a grade 
of above 70 per cent. was obtained, and in September 
the plant was operating very consistently, producing an 
average of from 4000 to 6000 cubic feet. of 70 per cent. 
helium during each operating day. It was necessary to 
re-process the gas in order to raise this purity to more 
than go per cent. 
Plant No. 2, using the Claude system, began to 
operate on May 1, 1918, and very quickly obtained 
NO. 2777, VOL. LET) 

able to produce helium steadily or consistently, and was 
finally permanently shut down during July rg2z. 
The Linde plant showed the most rapid progress, and 
it was decided in the fall of r9r8 to build a large pro- 
duction plant using the Linde process. This plant was 
completed in the spring of 1920, and operated for a few 
months during that year. Most of the time, however, 
was spent on testing out the equipment. About two 
million cubic feet of helium averaging 94 to 5 per cent. 
was produced, and this, with the helium obtained during 
the experimental work with the smaller plants, gave a 
total production up to this year of 2,300,000 cubic feet. 
Congress has furnished a fairly satisfactory sum for 
operations during the present fiscal year, July 1, 1922 
to June 30, 1923, and the plant is now producing ‘about 
15,000 cubic feet of 93 to 95 per cent. helium per day. 
- 
