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The experimental kelp-potash plant
CURRENT TOPICS.
506
[J. F. I.
Delivering Mail to Steamer After It Has Sailed. (Sckntific American, vol. cxxi, No. 8, p. I@, August 23, IgIg.)ane of the contemplated uses of the airplane in peace-time is that of overtaking steamers at sea for the purpose of placing delayed mail aboard. Obviously, the speed of the average airplane makes it possible to overtake a steamer several hours after it has left the port, thereby extending the mail service time that many hours. An experiment in delivering mail to a steamer is to be undertaken within a few days by C. 1. Zimmerman, a skilled pilot, who will follow the steamer Adriatic two or three hours after she has sailed for England, and overtaking her will drop a mail pouch with a wooden float attachment into the sea just ahead of her bow. This experiment will be closely followed by the post-office authorities and the steamship men, in order to determine the practicability of the scheme. It has also been suggested that steamers might carry small airplanes which, when the steamer neared port, might fly with bags of mail. If airplanes were employed to overtake the steamer, and one or more airplanes employed to make port some hours before the steamer, perhaps eight hours more might be saved in trans-Atlantic mail service. However, such a scheme would call for a considerable number of machines and pilots, and would entail a notable expense. The Experimental Kelp-Potash Plant of the United States Department of Agriculture, was erected during the summer of 1917 and put into operation in the early fall of that year (Jour. Indus.
Eng.
Chew.).
One hundred tons of raw kelp per day are subjected to drying, destructive distillation, lixiviation, evaporation, and fractional for the preparation of a high-grade potascrystallization, sium chloride. By-products, kelp-oils, creosote, pitch, ammonia, bleaching-carbons, salt, and iodine are yielded in commercial quantities by this process. The main problem now in hand is their commercialization. It is believed that they will be made to yield sufficient revenue to enable the main product, potash salts, to be marketed successfully in competition with foreign sources. Complete operating cost data are being tabulated covering the These, together with full specificavarious details of manufacture. tions and designs, will be made available for the public. The results obtained to date indicate that it will be possible to establish on kelp, as the basic raw material, a new American chemical industry of importance and usefulness to the nation.
506
[J. F. I.
Delivering Mail to Steamer After It Has Sailed. (Sckntific American, vol. cxxi, No. 8, p. I@, August 23, IgIg.)ane of the contemplated uses of the airplane in peace-time is that of overtaking steamers at sea for the purpose of placing delayed mail aboard. Obviously, the speed of the average airplane makes it possible to overtake a steamer several hours after it has left the port, thereby extending the mail service time that many hours. An experiment in delivering mail to a steamer is to be undertaken within a few days by C. 1. Zimmerman, a skilled pilot, who will follow the steamer Adriatic two or three hours after she has sailed for England, and overtaking her will drop a mail pouch with a wooden float attachment into the sea just ahead of her bow. This experiment will be closely followed by the post-office authorities and the steamship men, in order to determine the practicability of the scheme. It has also been suggested that steamers might carry small airplanes which, when the steamer neared port, might fly with bags of mail. If airplanes were employed to overtake the steamer, and one or more airplanes employed to make port some hours before the steamer, perhaps eight hours more might be saved in trans-Atlantic mail service. However, such a scheme would call for a considerable number of machines and pilots, and would entail a notable expense. The Experimental Kelp-Potash Plant of the United States Department of Agriculture, was erected during the summer of 1917 and put into operation in the early fall of that year (Jour. Indus.
Eng.
Chew.).
One hundred tons of raw kelp per day are subjected to drying, destructive distillation, lixiviation, evaporation, and fractional for the preparation of a high-grade potascrystallization, sium chloride. By-products, kelp-oils, creosote, pitch, ammonia, bleaching-carbons, salt, and iodine are yielded in commercial quantities by this process. The main problem now in hand is their commercialization. It is believed that they will be made to yield sufficient revenue to enable the main product, potash salts, to be marketed successfully in competition with foreign sources. Complete operating cost data are being tabulated covering the These, together with full specificavarious details of manufacture. tions and designs, will be made available for the public. The results obtained to date indicate that it will be possible to establish on kelp, as the basic raw material, a new American chemical industry of importance and usefulness to the nation.