THE CHEMICAL WORLD THIS WEEK
SEWAGE TREATMENT:
Complete Process An original approach for complete sewage treatment, based on a simple physical discovery, has come from two engineers at New York University. Ignoring the sludge-plagued biological treatment commonly found in city sewage works and avoiding presently expensive tertiary (recycling) processes, the engineers propose an economical, all-chemical scheme. It uses simple substances long in the trade—lime (or some other alkaline material) and activated carbon. The basic discovery from NYU is that soluble organic materials in waste water fall into two distinct classifications by molecular weight. Slightly more than half have a molecular weight of 1200 or more and the rest a molecular weight of 400 or less. Converting the higher to the lower group enables efficient removal of all the organics plus phosphorus and nitrogen by a suitable adsorber. A resulting two-step "Z-M" process was laid out by Dr. Matthew M. Zuckerman and Dr. Alan H. Molof last week before the American Society of Civil Engineering's second national symposium on sanitary engineering at Cornell University. New York state is currently financing the process through a 10,000 gallon-perday pilot plant, being built this summer by Ecolotech Research, Inc. The Z-M process provides the full sewage treatment currently done through primary (usually sedimentation), secondary (biological), and tertiary (for example, activated carbon) processes. Typical municipal treatment stops at the biological stage leaving nourishing effluent for river and lake algae.
NYU's Molof (left) and Zuckerman Economically practical 8 C&EN JULY 21, 1969
In the Z-M process, raw sewage, with 65 p.p.m. dissolved organic solids, goes through initial alkaline hydrolysis. This reaction, at high pH (typically 11.5), breaks the 35 p.p.m. of large organics into smaller molecules. Thus, all the organics are 400 molecular weight and less by the second stage, adsorption on carbon. The product water from the second stage has only 2 p.p.m. dissolved organics, according to the engineers. This is less than the 4 p.p.m. in drinking water in New York City. From this, associate professor Molof comments, the process "can make possible and practical the combined treating of waste water and production of drinking water in a single plant." Adsorbed organics from the second stage are incinerated, and the carbon is thermally regenerated. Dr. Molof states that a Z-M process plant would cost about 40% less to construct and 50% less to operate than conventional plants.
NSF FUNDING:
Scientist Attacks The National Science Foundation's budgetary roller coaster ride—now on the downgrade some $80 million from the $500 million for fiscal 1970 asked by the Johnson Administration and agreed to by President Nixon (C&EN, July 7, page 27)—is again generating cries of "financial crisis" among scientists. Their actions to restore the funds cut by the House Appropriations Committee through its Subcommittee on Independent Offices, chaired by Rep. Joe L. Evins (D.-Tenn.), are taking place along a number of fronts. Chemistry professor Minoru Tsutsui of Texas A&M University, active in last year's battle over NSF's budget as then president of the New York Academy of Sciences, is mounting a telegram and letter writing campaign by Texas scientists. Targets for their verbal missiles include Rep. Evins, Rep. George H. Mahon (D.-Tex.), members of the Senate, and Presidential science adviser Lee A. DuBridge. The message Dr. Tsutsui wants to get across is that the House's decision is a "serious action which will deepen the current crisis" and that basic research and education will suffer long-range and disastrous effects. Leading up to Dr. Tsutsui's campaign are moves made by the New York Academy of Sciences. Academy president Irving J. Selikoff and executive director E. S. Schanze have urged Rep. Mahon and Rep. Evins to reconsider the cutback "to avoid further irreparable damage to the cause of science." Dr. Selikoff has also written NYAS's 22,000 U.S. mem-
Minoru Tsutsui Cries of crisis
bers asking them to make known their views to their Senators. While it's too early to tell what success Dr. Tsutsui's campaign will have, Rep. Mahon and Dr. DuBridge have answered his telegrams. Rep. Mahon politely replies that Dr. Tsutsui's views will be kept "in mind as the legislative picture unfolds." Dr. DuBridge, however, points out that although the House can't reverse its vote, it might lift the budget cut to follow the Senate's action in conference. "We are making every effort to convince the Senate to recommend the full amount for NSF," he says. Meanwhile, at the national level, the ACS Committee on Chemistry and Public Affairs has discussed the federal funding situation at its last two meetings. At its last meeting it formed a Subcommittee on Graduate Education which will look into not only the NSF cut, but also the question of National Institutes of Health funding. Despite all this activity, the chances of restoring the full amount to NSF's budget remain slim.
TITANIUM:
Teijin Diversifies Given its standing as a major synthetic fiber maker in Japan, Teijin, Ltd., has diversified into chemical processing along the largely predictable paths of fiber intermediates, their feedstocks, and plastics. Not so its latest move—bankrolling a new titanium refining process. Through a joint venture soon to be established, Teijin and Nippon Soda Co. will build a 180 metric-ton-a-
month titanium sponge facility at the latter's Nihongi plant. The $5.5 million refining unit will use a sodium reduction technique developed by Nippon Soda. Teijin's contribution, at least initially, will be capital. At the same time, Teijin has subscribed all of a $4.2 million capital increase by Nisso Petrochemicals Industry Co., a Nippon Soda affiliate that produces ethylene glycol and other olefin derivatives. The projected titanium refinery, scheduled for startup late next year, will be a major factor in Japan's production of the metal. Last year's output of titanium sponge by the two current producers totaled 5400 metric tons, about 60% of which was exported. Both Japanese producers (and two of the three U.S. titanium sponge makers) use versions of the Kroll 33 process, in which ores are first converted to titanium tetrachloride. They are then reduced to porous titanium metal by dropping into molten magnesium in an inert atmosphere. Sodium can be used instead of magnesium, and this route is also commercially employed. For its own sodium reduction method, Nippon Soda claims an advantage over the Kroll process in product yield and purity, and says its method also promises an edge in sponge physical properties compared to competing sodium reduction processes. Nippon Soda got into the titanium business in the early 1950's via the Kroll process, but dropped out when a shift in U.S. defense planning ended the first titanium boom a few years later. Subsequent development work in fiber intermediates attracted Teijin's attention. In 1966 Teijin became Nippon Sodas largest stockholder (C&EN, Nov. 21, 1966, page 33) and now has a 20% interest in the firm. Its new investment in Nisso Petrochemicals makes Teijin one-third owner of that subsidiary. Taking yet another tack, the two parent firms have also begun cooperative research toward manufacturing protein from petroleum raw materials.
NATURAL GAS:
Project Rulison Ready Project Rulison, the underground nuclear explosion to stimulate flow of natural gas, now is scheduled for September. As the first commercial project to increase output of natural gas by nuclear energy, it will be a substantial improvement over the experimental Project Gasbuggy of December 1967. Rulison is a joint venture of Austral Oil of Houston (which
will pay 90% of the cost) and the Atomic Energy Commission. If the technique proves to be economically attractive, both the nation and Austral could benefit mightily, C. Wardell Leisk, Austral's chairman and chief executive officer, told a meeting of the Natural Gas Men of Houston. He cites U.S. Bureau of Mines' figures of 1966 which indicate that the technique could add 317 trillion standard cu. ft. to the nation's gas reserves—more than double what the reserves are now estimated to be. The value to Austral could reach $1.2 billion, Mr. Leisk estimates. His estimate is based on the possible recovery of half of the gas present in
data from Project Gasbuggy. In a year since that explosion, the well has produced more than 200 million cu. ft. of gas. Another well located about 400 feet away and drilled into the same formation has produced 85 million cu. ft. of gas during the past nine years. The Project Rulison device will be of a fission type, Mr. Leisk believes. Much less radioactivity should result; probably only about 10% of the tritium found in Gasbuggy will be in the gas. Although no standards for maximum permissible concentrations of radionuclides in the gas have been set, marketing arrangements might include four items, Mr. Leisk says. The gas may be scrubbed to reduce radionuclide concentrations, if any are present. The gas also might be diluted in pipelines with other gas as is now done to reduce carbon dioxide concentration. Use of the natural gas might be limited to nearby industrial markets or to on-site generation of electrical power.
TETRACYCLINE:
Voiding a Patent
AustraPs Leisk To benefit mightily
the 100 sections (640 acres each) under lease to Austral if one explosion is set off in each section. About 120 billion cu. ft. of gas are contained in each section of the Mesaverde formation in the Rulison Basin in west central Colorado. If about 6 trillion cu. ft. of gas is produced and sold for 20 cents per 1000 cu. ft., the gross income therefore would be more than $1 billion. Another $140 million gross income could result from recovery and sale of more than 100 million barrels of natural gas liquids produced with the gas. This income would depend on recovery of 30% of the ethane, 90% of the propane, and 95% of the butane, and 100% of the natural gasoline (C 5 and higher). The Mesaverde formation is porous, but has a very low permeability. Current conventional well stimulation techniques can't release much of the gas. The potential for success which attracts Austral was made clear by early
Tetracycline makers are being hauled into the courts again. This time the Justice Department has sued Chas. Pfizer & Co. and American Cyanamid for an estimated $25 million in damages, asks that Pfizer's patent for the antibiotic be canceled and that the company be barred from collecting royalties under the patent, and wants antitrust action against Pfizer, Cyanamid, Bristol-Myers, Olin Mathieson Chemical, Squibb Beech Nut, E. R. Squibb & Sons, and Upjohn. The civil action suit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia last week. The suit charges Pfizer with fraudulently obtaining the tetracycline patent on Jan. 11, 1955, by "knowingly making false and misleading statements" to the patent office and that Cyanamid "aided and abetted Pfizer" in obtaining the patent by "knowingly making similar misleading and deceptive statements." The suit alleges that the two companies failed to disclose that tetracycline had been produced during the manufacture of another antibiotic, aureomycin, and therefore was not in itself patentable. As a result, the suit contends, Pfizer was able to limit the number of suppliers and the Government was damaged by paying noncompetitive prices for the drug. The suit adds that the seven firms conspired to "monopolize the manufacture and sale of tetracycline." JULY 21, 1969 C&EN 9
