1238 Unfortunately, the very secrecy to which I have just referred prevents my making this brief article interesting. Instead of listing the extremely interesting and highly important problems we have been called upon to solve, a writer on this subject must have recourse to dull statistics. During the first year of its existence, the National Defense Research Committee spent approximately $10,000,000 through 270 contracts placed in 47 different universities, technical schools, and research laboratories; and 153 contracts placed with 39 industrial firms. Nearly 2,000 scientists are at work under these contracts and approximately the same number of technicians and assistants. Last June an Executive Order created the Office of Scientific Research and Development with Vannevar Bush as director. In his new capacity Dr. Bush was charged not only with many of his former responsibilities as chairman of NDRC but with the further task of coordinating research on medical problems affecting national defense. And most important of all, he has charge of coordinating and, where desirable, supplementing the scientific research activities for defense carried on by the Departments of War and Navy and other agencies of the Federal Government. The NDRC now becomes a part of the new Office of Scientific Research and Development and I, as the new chairman, am responsible to Dr. Bush. Roger Adams has become a member of the NDRC and is in charge of all the work of the chemists. A new Medical Research Committee of which A. N. Richards is chairman has been formed. The other members of this committee are L. H. Weed, A. R. Dochez, A. B. Hastings, and representatives of the Surgeon General of the Army, of the Navy, and of Public Health. Irvin Stewart is Executive Secretary of this committee, as well as of the NDRC and of the OSRD. This committee, which parallels the NDRC, is concerned with problems of medical research. On a scientific advisory council to the Director of the Office of Scientific Research and Development sits the Chairman of this committee, the Chairman of the NDRC, the Chairman of the National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics, and the coordinators of research of the Army and Navy. The Office of Scientific Research and Development maintains close connections with the National Research Council and its many sections and committees. Since the work of the NDRC is concerned Solely with research and development on instrumentalities of war, there are many chemical problems of national importance which lie outside its province. Some of these are clearly within the field
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Vol. 19, No. 22
of operation of the new Medical Research Committee, while others are the concern of the National Research Council and its agencies. Many chemists have been asked to cooperate in the national defense program through the Chemistry Section of the council, and especially in the field of biochemistry through the Medical Research Committee and the committees of
the council with which its work is closely associated. Undoubtedly there will be an expansion in this direction as well as in the work of the Chemical Division of the NDRC and gradually a still greater number of research chemists will be asked to play a part in the ever-increasing national defense effort. To those who have given freely of their time and talents, the country owes a debt of gratitude.
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Chemical Engineers Discuss Defense
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XIGENCIES of defense production and accompanying plant secrecy sent 559 members and guests of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers to plantless Virginia Beach, Va., November 3 to 5, for the largest meeting in the institute's history. Problems of priorities, materials, equipment, and efficiency of plant processes occupied the five technical sessions of the institute's program, consisting of a symposium on chemical industry in the defense program and 20 technical papers. Sidney D. Kirkpatrick, editor of Chemical & Metallurgical Engineering, was elected president of the institute for 1942, succeeding Francis C. Frary, of the Aluminum Research Laboratories, retiring president. James L. Bennett, of Hercules Powder Co., was elected vice president, and the institute's secretary, Stephen L. Tyler, and treasurer, C. R. DeLong, were elected to succeed themselves. New directors elected for three years were: Thomas H. Chilton, du Pont; Warren L. McCabe, Carnegie Institute of Technology; Mark E. Putnam, Dow Chemical Co. ; and Walter G. Whitman, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Reports of the institute's officers showed its affairs to be in flourishing condition. Membership now stands at 2852, representing an increase of 14.6 per cent in a year. Accredited during the past year for teaching chemical engineering were the following institutions: Cooper Union (day course) Rice Institute University of Delaware University of Rochester The necessity for full utilization of our resources in essential metals to offset shortages was emphasized by R. E. McConnell, of the Engineers Defense Board", in opening Monday afternoon's Symposium on Mobilizing Engineering Materials for Defense. Vast reserves of needed metals
exist in what Mr. McConnell called "passive scrap" throughout the Nation. Silver now stored as bullion, the speaker pointed out, can be safely and efficiently put to important use in relieving the stringency of the copper situation by serving as bus bare and other conductors of heavy electric currents necessary in defense plants. Inventories of metals and other engineering materials beyond immediate needs represent "passive scrap" within the speaker's definition, as do neglected stores of true scrap which lie unused. Four factors enter the solution of the problem of supply and will assist in easing present and prospective stringencies: (1) the large safety factor in calculated requirements; (2) inventories beyond needs; (3) increased production capacity; and (4) the shifts of demand to substitutes where possible. E. R. Weidlein, chief of the Chemicals and Allied Products Branch, OPM, discussed changes in administration of the production program as they affect industry through priorities and allocations. New efficiency in carrying out the program is anticipated from the present seven-man board in charge. Successful meeting of needs of both defense and industry depends upon cooperation of producers and consumers, the speaker urged, particularly in avoiding accumulations of inventory. Arthur W. Hixson, of Columbia University, spoke briefly on a proposed method of utilizing high aluminum clays to amplify the Nation's reserves of aluminum ores. The suggested process consists of dissolving aluminum and iron from clay with hydrochloric acid, separating iron by selective solution of ferric chloride in an organic solvent (butyl acetate or diisopropyl ether, for example), and recovering aluminum chloride and hydrochloric acid from the purified solution. Other speakers were Walter G. Whitman, Donald B. Keyes, and Laurence CONTINTTBD ON PAGB 1 3 6 2
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1362 Chemical Engineers Discuss Defense COKTINUED FROM PAGE 1 2 3 8
Brown, acting chief, Chemical Section, Division of Civilian Supply, OPM. F. W. Willard, institute representative of the Engineers Defense Board, presided. R. C. Bardwell, Chesapeake & Ohio Railway, reviewed the chemical industries of Tidewater, Va., which he traced back to a glass factory started in 1608 in James town. The present chemical industry in Tidewater begins at Hampton Roads and extends up the James River well into southwestern Virginia. Advantages of this district are easily available markets and raw materials, adequate transporta tion, and abundant power and fuel. The chemical industry has the largest capital investment of any industry in Virginia, accounting for more than 40 per cent of the state's total investment in manufactures. T. McLean Jasper and Charles M. Scudder of the A. O. Smith Corp.. Mil waukee, Wis., discussed the construction of multilayer pressure vessels. The walls of these vessels are made from a number of layers of de-scaled steel, each layer be ing wrapped around the cylinder by me chanical means and then all layers welded together along the edges. Recently, multilayer vessels have been so constructed that the inner layers are subjected to compression, and the outer layers are in tension upon completion. When the inside pressure upon the vessel is raised to the working value, the changes in stress combine with stresses already pres ent to produce a more even distribution through the wall than is otherwise possible. Methods of storing volatile liquids to prevent losses were discussed by D. Ε Larson, Chicago Bridge & Iron Co. Costs of construction and losses through evapora tion and breathing for all the usual types of storage vessels were presented in graphic form. Balloon and breather roofs were compared with floating roof and cone roof tanks as well as spheriod pressure vessels. The production of sodium silicate and hydrochloric acid by the interaction of sand, salt, and water vapor is a practical impossibility, according to R. K. Her and E. J. Tauch of E. I. du Pont de Nemours & Co., Inc. The authors investigated this proposed method by building laboratory models of three different production units and determined the constants for the re action under a variety of conditions. R. B. Mears and H. J. Fahrney, of the Aluminum Company of America, pre sented a paper on cathodic protection of aluminum equipment. To prevent corro sion of aluminum equipment by solution of various chemicals, zinc strips are at tached to the equipment in a manner which prevents galvanic or corrosive ac tion. The position of the zinc is deter mined largely by the problem. In several illustrative examples in which an alumi-
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num body was jacketed by a steel shell, the zinc was bolted to the steel. In other examples of corrosion in an aluminum ves sel, the zinc was attached to heat transfer pipes or the shell of the vessel. Zinc pro tection is most successful in neutral or slightly acid solutions and will probably not be satisfactory in alkaline liquids. An attack on the problem of utilizing propane, a petroleum industry by-product, in refining tall oil was made and reported by A. W. Hixson and A. N. Hixson, the former of Columbia University and the latter from the University of Pennsyl vania. The authors first determined whether propane could dissolve com pounds other than those from petroleum and found that several nonpetroleum com pounds are soluble at room temperatures but insoluble at high ones. They investi gated the solubility of oleic and abietic acids in propane with view of using this process to recover these products from tall oil, by-product of the manufacture of sulfate paper pulp. The data obtained on this ternary system, the authors stated, are applicable to design calcula tions and the system appears to be an ex cellent one for extraction with reflux. R. M. Jackson of the Standard Oil De velopment Co. and T. K. Sherwood of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology presented a joint paper on the perform ance of refinery gas absorbers with and without intercoolers. The absorber was plant size, 9 feet in diameter and 71 feet tail, having 15 plates. Cracking coil gas was absorbed by lean oil fed into the top of the tower. The data obtained on the test runs were used to check actual condi tions with those predicted by design calcu lations. In almost every case there was good agreement, and for total gas ab sorbed theory was about 10 per cent low compared with actual experience. Absorption rates of carbon dioxide in diethanolamine solutions were discussed by D. S. Cryder and J. O. Maloney of the Pennsylvania State College. Their work was done on an 8-inch diameter, 16-foot column packed with 0.75-inch Raschig rings. Carbon dioxide was injected into the bottom of the tower and the amine solution cascaded from the top. The conclusions drawn were: (a) an increase in the percentage of diethanol amine converted to the amine carbonate results in a rapid decrease in the over-all absorption coefficient; (b) over the range 980 to 2460 pounds per hour per square foot an increase in liquid rate causes an in crease in the value of the absorption coefficient; (c) increase in temperature from 25° to 55° C. has no appreciable effect on the value of the absorption coefficient; (d) with an increase in the normality of the amine, the absorption coefficient passes through a maximum which is not af fected by the percentage conversion of the amine to the amine carbonate; (e) com parison of absorption coefficient values from this investigation with data from other amine solutions shows the same xnag-
Vol. 19f No. 22 nitude; (f) these absorption values are higher than those obtained by scrubbing with water and carbonate; (g) over the range investigated, the equation of Hutta based on a concept of absorption followed by a rapid irreversible reaction offers a reasonable explanation of results. C. M. Cooper, R. J. Christl, and L. C. Peery of du Pont, presented data on the effect of gas and liquor rates on per formance in a 30-inch square tower packed with Raschig rings. A carbon dioxidewater solution was passed downward through 86 inches of packing and an air stream passed upward. Water rates varied from 13,200 t o 56,000 pounds per hour per square foot, and air rates, from 19 to 368 pounds per square foot. Transfer unit heights were calculated on a common temperature basis of 18° C. by graphic integration. The authors plotted transfer heights against super ficial gas velocity, which in the tests varied from 0.O8 to 1.3 feet per second, and found that at lower velocities there was a pronounced rise in the (H. T. U.) values. Divergent results on distillation in a wetted-wall tower were reported in two papers. One investigation, reported by Ή. F. Johnstone and R. L. Pigford of University of Illinois, was based on a tower 6 feet i n length by 1.17 inches in diameter in which a variety of mixtures was distilled. A. J. Surowiec and C. C. Furnas of Yale University worked with ethanol-water mixtures in a 12-inch tower 11 feet high. Differences between the two sets of res-ults lay in effects of various factors on efficiencies. Five binary systems in packed columns were investigated by D . W. Duncan, J. H. Koffolt, a.nd J. R. Withrow, of Ohio State University, in studying the effects on H. T. U. value of vapor-liquid ratio, concentration of vapors entering the column, rate of throughput, slope of the vapor equilibrium line. ''Rectification in the Presence of an Insoluble Component" was the title of a paper by E. M. Schoenborn, of the Uni versity of Delaware, and J. H. Koffolt and J. R. Withrow of Ohio State Univer sity. In this investigation the system trichloroethylene-toluene was distilled in the normal manner and also with steam. The institute's spring meeting will be held in Boston.. e-^©
T H E Junior Chemical Engineers of New York, Ν. Υ., will hold an open banquet meeting on December 4, 6:30 P. M., at Stouffer's Restaurant, 3 East 57th St. This will be a. get-together for students and young chemical engineers who are in New York for the Chemical Industries Ex position. R. P. Russell, vice president, Standard Oil Development Co., will he the principal speaker. Students will be wel comed on behalf of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers by S. D. Kirkpatrick, president of the institute.
