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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XL. No. 1023 



expensive chemical works in which soda is 

 made chemically and from where the mar- 

 ket can be supplied more profitably. 



In addition, we can cite the artificial ni- 

 trate processes in Norway, which, notwith- 

 standing their low efficiency and expensive 

 installation, can furnish nitrate in compe- 

 tition with the natural nitrate beds of 

 Chile, because the latter are hampered by 

 the cost of extraction from the soil where 

 fuel for crystallization is expensive, in addi- 

 tion to the considerable cost of freight. 



But there is no better example illustra- 

 ting the far-reaching effect of seemingly 

 secondary conditions upon the success of a 

 chemical process than the history of the 

 Leblanc soda process. 



This famous process was the forerunner 

 of chemical industry. For almost a century 

 it dominated the enormous group of indus- 

 tries of heavy chemicals, so expressively 

 called by the French "La Grande Indus- 

 trie Chimique," and now we are witnesses 

 of the lingering death agonies of this 

 chemical colossus. Through the Leblanc 

 process, large fortunes have been made and 

 lost; but even after its death, it will leave 

 a treasure of information to science and 

 chemical engineering, the value of which 

 can hardly be overestimated. 



Here, then, is a very well worked-out 

 process, admirably studied in all its details, 

 which, in its heroic struggle for existence, 

 has drawn upon every conceivable resource 

 of ingenuity furnished by the most learned 

 chemists and the most skilful engineers, 

 who succeeded in bringing it to an extra- 

 ordinary degree of perfection, and which, 

 nevertheless, has to succumb before inexor- 

 able, although seemingly secondary, condi- 

 tions. 



Strange to say, its competitor, the Solvay 

 process, entered into the arena after a suc- 

 cession of failures. "When Solvay, as a 

 yoTing man, took up this process, he was, 



himself, totally ignorant of the fact that 

 no less than about a dozen able chemists 

 had invented and reinvented the very re- 

 action on which he had pinned his faith; 

 that, furthermore, some had tried it on a 

 commercial scale, and had, in every in- 

 stance, encountered failure. At that time, 

 all this must, undoubtedly, have been to 

 young Solvay a revelation sufficient to dis- 

 hearten almost anybody. But he had one 

 predominant thought to which he clung as 

 a last hope of success, and which would prob- 

 ably have escaped most chemists; he rea- 

 soned that, in this process, he starts from 

 two watery solutions, which, when brought 

 together, precipitate a dry product, bicar- 

 bonate of soda ; in the Leblanc process, the 

 raw materials must be melted together, 

 with the use of expensive fuel, after which 

 the mass is dissolved in water, losing all 

 these valuable heat units, while more heat 

 has again to be applied to evaporate to 

 dryness. 



After all, most of the weakness of the Le- 

 blanc process resides in the greater con- 

 sumption of fuel. But the cost of fuel, 

 here again, is determined by freight rates. 

 This is so true that we find that the last 

 few Leblanc works which manage to keep 

 alive are exactly those which are situated 

 near unusually favorable shipping points, 

 where they can obtain cheap fuel, as well 

 as cheap raw materials, and whence they 

 can most advantageously reach certain 

 profitable markets. 



But another tremendous handicap of the 

 Leblanc process is that it gives as one of its 

 by-products, hydrochloric acid. Profita- 

 ble use for this acid, as such, can be found 

 only to a limited extent. It is true that 

 hydrochloric acid could be used in much 

 larger quantities for many purposes where 

 sulphuric acid is used now, but it has, 

 against sulphuric acid, a great freight dis- 

 advantage. In its commercially available 



