UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



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Washington, D. C. 



Contribution from the Bureau of Soils 



MILTON WHITNEY, Chief 



PROFESSIONAL PAPER 



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September 28, 1915 



CONTENTS. 



Page. I 



Introduction 1 New modification of the chamber process 



Methods of manufacture 2 Factory considerations 



Measurement of a plant 's efficiency 5 | Appendix 



THE PRODUCTION OF SULPHURIC ACID AND A 

 NEW METHOD OF MANUFACTURE. 



By William H. Waggaman, Scientist in Fertilizer Investigations. 



INTRODUCTION. 



The importance of sulphuric acid in science, arts, and manufacture 

 has been increasing steadily for many years. Although scarcely any 

 industry exists which does not employ this acid either directly or 

 indirectly in the manufacture of its product, 1 the bulk of the sul- 

 phuric acid produced, both in this country and abroad, is used in the 

 manufacture of fertilizer materials. 



Since Liebig first proposed the treatment of bones or phosphate 

 rock with sulphuric acid in order to render the phosphoric acid pres- 

 ent water soluble, superphosphate has been the basis of the fertilizer 

 industry, and the economic production of sulphuric acid has been 

 the aim of numerous investigators and chemical engineers. The pro- 

 duction of sulphuric acid of various strengths in the United States for 

 the past three years, according to the figures of the United States Geo- 

 logical Survey, is given in Table I. 



Because of the difficulty hi shipping such a commodity all of the 

 sulphuric acid produced is consumed in this country. Some of the 

 products manufactured therefrom are shipped abroad but the quantity 

 of acid entering into them is but a small percentage of the total 

 production. 



In 1913 the United States consumed 1,931,468 short tons of phos- 

 phate rock. Since practically all of this was made into acid phos- 



527°— Bull. 283—15- 



i Phalen, W. C Mineral Resources (1913). 

 -1 



