Saline Water Meeting Draws 60 Nations
Control room at Goodrich-Gulf's plant at Institute, W.Va., which can make 18,000 long tons per year of cis-l,4-polybutadiene for blending with SBR in tire treads
Goodrich May Buy Rest Of Goodrich-Gulf Negotiations continue for B. F. Goodrich to acquire Gulf Oil's 50% interest in Goodrich-Gulf Chemicals, their jointly owned subsidiary. GoodrichGulf, formed in 1952, makes synthetic rubber and chemicals used in making plastics. If the deal goes through, at least $50 million would change hands on a gross plant value of about $200 million. Goodrich would have sole ownership of three synthetic rubber facilities, leaving U.S. Rubber the only remaining major tire maker without its own general-purpose synthetic rubber production. U.S. gets styrene-butadiene rubber and polybutadiene (emulsion polymerized) from TexasU.S., a joint venture with Texaco. Goodrich-Gulfs SBR plants—at Port Neches, Tex., and at Institute, W.Va.—give it the second largest capacity in the industry, about 274,000 long tons annually. (Goodyear has the largest SBR capacity, with 302,500 long tons annually.) GoodrichGulf also can make 18,000 long tons annually of ds-polybutadiene at Institute, W.Va. Besides the two existing rubber plants, Goodrich-Gulf has a 60,000 ton-per-year polybutadiene plant scheduled to go on stream next year at Orange, Tex. The plant is designed to produce polyisoprene as well. Earlier this year, Gulf sold its interest in Callery Chemical. In August, it began reorganizing its domestic 36
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chemicals department. David L. Matthews, former president of Goodrich-Gulf, became Gulf Oil's v.p. in charge of chemical manufacturing and marketing in the U.S. This operation includes functions previously in Gulf Oil's petrochemical department and Spencer Chemical's industrial chemicals division.
Allied Cuts Malic Acid Price to Citric Level Malic acid now competes directly with citric acid, both selling for 2 9 1 / 2 cents a pound. Allied Chemical cut malic's price (from 62 cents a pound) last week following start-up of its 20 million pound-a-year malic acid plant at Mounds ville, W.Va. The U.S. market for food and beverage acidulants—a market at which malic is aiming—is about 90 million pounds a year. Of this total, citric acid took about 60 million pounds in 1964. The remainder of the market was held mostly by phosphoric, adipic, and fumaric acids. Chas. Pfizer & Co. and Miles Laboratories are the major U.S. citric acid producers. Miles is expanding its capacity by 50%. About 20% (by weight) less malic than citric acid is needed to obtain the same taste in food and beverages, Allied says. The company also makes fumaric and adipic acids. At 1 8 1 / 2 cents a pound, fumaric is the most attractive of the acids. But it has limited solubility in cold water, a handicap in the beverage market.
"The most impressive array of water engineering talent ever assembled in history" gathered in Washington last week to discuss practical ways of getting the salt—or the water—out of briny water. Few disputed Interior Secretary Stewart Udall's description of the cast. For 1500 desalination experts came from some 60 nations to discuss all technical means—from solar to atomic energy—for economically producing fresh water from salty sources. President Johnson, through science adviser Donald F. Hornig, produced a stir at the outset by announcing a U.S.-Mexican study aimed at building plants that would supply vast regions of the Southwest with both water and electricity. The study would explore, besides basic desalination processes, the best type of fuel to do the job. The U.S. is currently accelerating its own R&D on saline water through a $220 million program spread over the next six years. Three plants are already operating—in Roswell, N.M., Webster, S.D., and Freeport, Tex.— with several pilot plants strung out at Wrightsville Beach, N.C. "We have concrete goals in view," Dr. Hornig said for the President (who was in New York visiting with Pope Paul V I ) : "by 1968, to construct plants with the capacity of 10 million gallons per day; by 1970 to extend the range to 100 million gallon plants. We are also at work on smaller plants varying in size from less than 1 million gallons to 15 million gallons per day employing many different processes." The most advanced federal project involves plans for a 150 million gallonper-day plant powered by atomic energy. As foreseen by the Interior Department, the Atomic Energy Commission, and the San Diego Metropolitan Water District in California, the plant would produce fresh water for 22 cents per thousand gallons and electricity for 3 mills per kilowatt hour. "Our immediate goal," Mr. Udall said at the conference, "is developing plants to produce between 1 million and 10 million gallons per day for 50 cents a thousand gallons." The conference was in one sense a kickoff for further federal effort in spreading desalination know-how to all parts of the world that need it.
