INDUSTRY.
On board the clamshell dredge, Liberty, Calspray officials look over the plans for t h e initial dredging and fill operations for its new fertilizer plant site in Richmond. Around the plans are Calvin Dorough (left), superintendent of manufacturing; P . S. Williams, vice president and chief engineer; C. £ . Cody, regional manager of marketing; A. W. Mohr, president; Leslie Hamilton, operations coordinator, and E . W. Cannon, v p
Calspray Goes All Out in Fertilizers Expansion program starts with a $16 million plantât Richmond, Calif., and two new laboratories *TT«AJKING A GIANT S T E P into fertilizers,
-*- California Spray-Chemical is starting a $ 1 6 million, four-unit plant at Richmond, Calif. T w o other units of the complex a r e being built b y Standard Oil of California, Calspray's parent. Calspray *s new fertilizer plants will receive ammonia from t h e n e w ammonia plant t o b e built at Standard's Richmond refinery. This . ammonia plant's basic r a w materials wil be natural gas, air, and hydrogen from pres-
ent refinery operations. Part of i t s ammonia will b e oxidized in the r e finery's new nitric acid plant; another part will go directly to Calspray's c o m plex fertilizer plant, ammonium sulfate plant, and t w o solutions plants. Nitric acid will also "cross t h e border" from the refinery t o Calspray's complex fertilizer and solutions plant. Calspray's pelleted complex fertilizer plant and ammonium nitrate solution plant will b e built by Chemical & I n -
dustrial Corp. of Cincinnati. C&I is representative of t h e F r e n c h P E C (Potasse et Engrais Chimiques) complex fertilizer process. This unit will be t h e first P E C fertilizer plant t o b e built outside of Europe. Calspray will obtain p h o s p h a t e rock from Utah and I d a h o quarries, potash from natural deposits at Searles Lake, Calif., spent process sulfuric acid from refinery operations, and a relatively small a m o u n t of virgin sulfuric acid. Products Will Be V a r i e d · Chief products of t h e Calspray operations will b e nitric solutions both for direct application alone or sometimes mixed with other simple fertilizers i n farmers' recently developed mixer-spreaders, anhydrous ammonia, aqueous ammonia, and high analysis complex fertilizers in t h e pellet form. T h e balanced plant foods will b e specifically tailored to meet t h e highly diversified requirements of western crops a n d soils. Calspray has already h a d successful experience selling fertilizer. In 1953 it bought ivlid-State Chemical Supply, a n d last year expanded its business t o include all of California a n d Arizona. T o this area Calspray will a d d N e w Mexico a n d Nevada immediately. Later it will expand "to Maine, if w e can." Supplemental Labs. As a n adjunct to t h e fertilizer plants, Calspray plans two n e w labs—one for research a n d one for bio-screening. T h e n e w research development l a b will b e engaged in seeking safer a n d more effective organic and inorganic chemicals for u s e as Ortho fungicides, insecticides, a n d herbicides, as well as fertilizers. Pesticides developed in these labs will b e tested for effectiveness and safety o n experimental animals, insects a n d plants at t h e bio-screening lab, which is being built in a remodeled building on Standard's tank farm hill outside Richmond.
initial dredging and fill operations have started on the site of Calspray's four n e w fertilizer plants. Dredging was started by Associated Dredging's clamshell dredge, Liberty. Later, its big suction dredge finished the job. The bulldozer is one of Walsh Construction's many bulldozers at work packing and spreading the fill being trucked in to the Richmond plant site
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