VOL.
I N D U S T R I A L A N D E N G I N E E R I N G CHEMISTRY
776
17% N O . 24
T h e Division of Water, Sewage, and Sanitation Chemistry Edward Bartow S t a t e University o f Iowa, Iowa C i t y , Iowa RIOR t o 1913, chemists interested in water supply, sewage disposal, and related subjects were presenting papers before several sections of t h e
P
AMERICAN CHEMICAL SOCIETY and before
the general session of the American Water Works Association. Chemists of neither group were satisfied, and the same was true o f superintendents and engineers when papers of interest to them were scattered among the more numerous papers on general chemical and bacteriological subjects a t national meetings. At t h e suggestion of interested members of
the
AMERICAN
CHEMICAL
SOCIETY,
Edward Bartow presented to the Council of the SOCIETY in Milwaukee on March 24,1913, a request that a section devoted t o water problems be formed in the SOCIETY. A t this meeting: "It was voted that Dr. Bartow be appointed a committee of one to advise with others interested i n the formation of a section on sanitary chemistry and t o report to the President on the advisability of gathering together a t future meetings of t h e SOCIETY, papers on sanitation, water, and sewage disposal in an appropriate section" (1). Suh a section was formed and given the name, "Section of Water, Sewage, and Sanitation Chemistry", corresponding t o Division 14 of Chemical Abstracts, and the first meeting of the newly formed section was held in Rochester in September, 1913. Because of Dr. Bartow's inability to be present, W. W. Skinner presided at the first meeting and H. P. Corson acted as secretary (2). T h e division was authorized at the N e w Orleans meeting of the Council (3). For the year 1914. President A. D . Little appointed Edward Bartow as chairman of the division and H . P. Corson was named as secretary. The first officers elected by the new division were Edward Bartow, chairman; E. B . Phelps, vice chairman; H. P. Corson, secretary; executive committee, the officers with C. P. Hoover and E. H. S. Bailey. Through the past 25 years, chairmanship o f the division has been held by: Edward Bartow E H . S. Bailey Robert Spurr Weston J. W. Ellens W. P . Mason A . M . Buswell W. W . Skinner F. W. Mohlman W. O . Collins 8. E. Coburn W. D . HatBeld A. 6. Behrman E. 8. Hopkins R. C . Bard well A. P . Blaek
1913-16 1917 1918-19 1920 1921 1922-3 1924 1925-6 1927 1928-9 1930-1 1932-3 1934-5 1936-7 1938-
Serving as secretary have been the following: H. P . Corson W. W. Skinner F. R. Georgia W. D . Hatfield W. D . Collins E. J. Tbehault C. S. Boruff C. R . Hoover
1913-18 1919-23 1924-6 1927 1928-30 1931-2 1933-5 1936-
8iz»ce i t s formation, the division has
Edward B a r t o w , f o u n d e r a n d first c h a i r m a n
industrial wastes. T h e treatment of industrial wastes within the factory has been studied with results which have brought additional profits to the factories concerned. Radioactive natural waters have been found, and as fluorine in drinking water has been suspected as the cause of mottled enamel o n teeth, surveys of the fluorine content of waters throughout the United States have been made. The removal of tastes and odors in water by activated carbon and chloramines has been developed. Members of t h e division include chemists in water and sewage purification plants, chemists in industries which require pure water supply and proper waste disposal, chemists for railways, teachers of water chemistry, chemists for state and federal governments, and sanitary engineers. l i t e r a t u r e Cited
held symposia either alone or at joint meetings with other divisions. In 1915, there was a symposium on the activated sludge method of sewage purification. In 1929, a t a joint meeting with t h e Division of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry and the Division of Gas and Fuel Chemistry, the subject of the symposium was boiler room chemistry. I n 1932, there was a symposium on analytical methods, and in 1934, a symposium was held with Section A of the Division of Physical and Inorganic Chemistry o n the subject of inorganic chemistry of water supply. During the present year, a joint meeting was held a t Baltimore with the Division of Colloid Chemistry as a Symposium o n Colloids and Waste and Water Treatment, and at the Boston meeting with the D i vision of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry on the nature and treatment of industrial wastes. Including the 1939 fall meeting of the AMERICAN CHEMICAL
SOCIETY, the Division of Water, Sewage, and Sanitation Chemistry has furnished fifty programs of 602 papers for t h e SOCIETY.
Twenty-five years of progress in water, sewage, and sanitation chemistry are shown by the increase in the number of and interest in papers presented before the division. I t has been the object of the division to contribute to this progress by encouraging the prosecution and publication of research on both laboratory and plant scales, with less emphasis o n reports of operating data and routine tests. The period of the division's existence has seen the application on a large scale of the lime and soda softening process, and the use of base exchange processes for household as well as for laundry and industrial purposes and municipal suplies. During these twenty-five years we have witnessed the extension of sterilization methods from bleaching powder to liquid chlorine and the chloramines with the introduction of pH control methods for coagulation and softening. The activated sludge method of sewage purification has been developed from the first American experiments reported at the division's first meeting to the recent completion of the largest installation of this type in the world in a plant of the Chicago Sanitary District. Studies of stream pollution have shown the necessity for treating sewage and
(1) J. Am. Chem. Soc., Proc., 3 5 , 6 3 (1913). (2) Ibid., 3 5 , 93 ( 1 9 1 3 ) . (3) Ibid.. 37, 46 ( 1 9 1 5 ) .
Fertilizer Industry Profits
A
SUMMARY of corporation income tax returns for 1937 by industrial groups and subgroups, recently released by the Bureau of Internal Revenue, includes returns filed by 420 fertilizer companies, 27 of which were inactive. The 231 corporations which reported net incomes had a total gross income of $163,158,000 and a total n e t income of $9,441,000. The total normal tax amounted to $1,127,000, the surtax on undivided profits to $239,000, and t h e excess profits tax to $73,000. Deficits were reported by 162 companies; their total gross income was $25,014,000 and total deficit was $1,470,000. The ratio of net t o gross for all fertilizer companies was 4.2 per cent, compared t o 5.9 per cent for all manufacturing companies. Data are in large part for the 1937-38 fiscal year and represent returns of the 1938 spring season. The average fertilizer manufacturer over a 10-year period made a net profit of 1.25 cents from each dollar of sales. Wax
B
Substitutes
ECAUSE of the difficulties of obtaining carnauba, ozokerite, and Japan waxes, and the high prices of these materials, the Glyco Products Co., Inc., 148 Lafayette St., New York, N . Y., has introduced substitutes made from domestic raw materials. Acrawax, a carnauba wax substitute, has a melting point of 95° t o 97° C. It is soluble, hot, in toluene, naphtha, turpentine, alcohol, mineral spirits, and other hydrocarbon solvents. Solutions in these materials give clear, transparent gels on cooling. Acrawax is insoluble in water. Ozowax, the substitute for ozokerite, has a melting point of 76° to 8 5 ° C . It is soluble, hot. in t h e usual hydrocarbon solvents, and these solutions produce clear, transparent gels on cooling. Nipocer, replacing Japan wax, h a s a melting point of 4 6 ° t o 49° C. It is soluble, hot, in toluene, naphtha, turpentine, e t c . I t emulsifies readily with the usual agents, giving stable, smooth emulsions.
