184 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLII. No. 1075 



THE FRODVCTION OF RADIUM IN COLO- 

 RADO 



Seoretaey of the Interior Lane authorizes 

 the statement that the production of radium 

 from Colorado carnotite ores by the Bureau of 

 Mines, in connection with the National Radium 

 Institute, has passed the experimental stage 

 in its new process and is now on a successful 

 manufacturing basis. He says : 



The cost of one gram of radium metal produced 

 in the form of bromide during March, April and 

 May of the present year was $36,050, I am in- 

 formed by Dr. Charles L. Parsons, in charge of 

 the radium investigations of the bureau. This in- 

 cludes the cost of ore, insurance, repairs, amortiza- 

 tion allowance for plant and equipment, cost of 

 Bureau of Mines cooperation, and all expenses inci- 

 dent to the production of high-grade radium 

 bromide. When you consider that radium has been 

 selling for $120,000 and $160,000 a gram, you will 

 see just what the Bureau of Mines has accom- 

 plished along these lines. 



The cost of producing radium in the small ex- 

 perimental plant during the first few months of 

 the bureau's activities was somewhat higher but 

 not enough to seriously effect the final average. 



The public, however, should not infer that this 

 low cost of production necessarily means an im- 

 mediate drop in the selling price of radium. The 

 National Radium Institute was fortunate in se- 

 curing through the Crucible Steel Company the 

 right to mine ten claims of carnotite ores belong- 

 ing to them and this was practically the only ore 

 available at the time. Since then new deposits 

 have been opened but these are closely held and 

 according to the best judgment of the experts em- 

 ployed by the Bureau of Mines the Colorado and 

 Utah fields, which are much richer in radium-bear- 

 ing ores than any others known, will supply ore for 

 a few years only at the rate of production that ob- 

 tained when the European war closed down the 

 mines. The demand for radium will also increase 

 rapidly, for the two or three surgeons who have 

 a sufficient amount of this element to entitle them 

 to speak from experience are obtaining results in 

 the cure of cancer that are increasingly encourag- 

 ing as their knowledge of its application improves. 

 A few more reports like that presented to the 

 American Medical Association at its recent San 

 Francisco meeting and the medical profession, as 

 a whole, will be convinced of its efficacy. Under 

 all the circumstances that have come to my knowl- 

 edge it does seem to me that it behooves the gov- 



ernment to make some arrangement whereby these 

 deposits, BO unique in their extent and their rich- 

 ness, may be conserved in the truest sense for our 

 people, by extracting the radium from the ores 

 where it now lies useless and putting it to work 

 for the eradication of cancer in the hospitals of 

 the Army and Navy and the Public Health Serv- 

 ice. 



The ten carnotite claims being operated at Long 

 Park, Colorado, by the National Radium Institute 

 have already produced over 796 tons of ore aver- 

 aging above two per cent, uranium oxide. The 

 cost of ore delivered at the radium plant in Den- 

 ver has averaged $81.30 per ton. This included 

 15 per cent, royalty, salary of Bureau of Mines 

 employees, amortization of camp and equipment 

 and all expenses incident to the mining, transpor- 

 tation, grinding and sampling of the ore. 



A concentrating plant for low-grade ores has 

 been erected at the mines and is successfully re- 

 covering material formerly wasted. Grinding and 

 sampling machinery has been installed at Denver 

 and a radium extraction plant erected in the same 

 city. The radium plant has now a capacity of 

 three tons of ore per day, having been more than 

 doubled in size since last February. Before that 

 time that plant had been run more or less on an ex- 

 perimental scale although regularly producing 

 radium since June, 1914. To July 1, slightly over 

 three grams of radium metal had been obtained in 

 the form of radium barium sulfate containing 

 over one milligram of radium to the kilogram of 

 sulfates. The conversion of the sulfates into 

 chlorides and the purification of the radium there- 

 from is easily accomplished and with very small 

 loss of material. Unfortunately, however, special 

 acid-proof enamel ware, obtainable only in France, 

 has not been delivered of sufficient capacity to 

 handle the crystallization of the full plant produc- 

 tion, so that a little less than half the output, or to 

 be exact, 1,304 milligrams of radium element have 

 been delivered to the two hospitals connected with 

 the National Radium Institute. The radium re- 

 maining can be crystallized at any time from neu- 

 tral solution in apparatus already installed, but 

 the greater rapidity and efficiency of production 

 of this very valuable material by the methods used 

 have decided the Bureau of Mines to await the 

 completion of apparatus now being built before 

 pushing the chloride crystallization to full capae- 

 ity. 



The average radium extraction of all ore mined 

 by the National Radium Institute has been over 

 85 per cent, of the amount present in the ore as 



