The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-09
7TRRoY SHON15- STE OF 6TW

would quickly become extinct and our lakes and oceans would soon become great bodies of concentrated nitric acid.
 Among the multitude of purposes to which the various combinations of nitro- gen may be put, two great fields of use- fitness serve to make an adequate supply of nitrogen absolutely indispensable to America-the field explosives and that of fertilizer.
 The Use of Nitrogen
 In Explosives.
 Tn the first of these fields nitrogen is supreme. Tn the manufacture of explosives two classes are recognized. slow or low order, used. for example, for propelling a projectile from a gun, and fast or high order explosives, called detonators. used to explode projectiles. mines, torpedoes etc.. to secure the greatest possible de- structive effect.
 In either product nitrogen must be used Tn one form 1t Is nitric acid, which when applied to hbrous materials. such as cot ton. flax. wood pulp, etc.. produces nitro cellulose, the basis of our most valuable propellant-smokeless powder. Tn another form 1t is sa1tpetre, which when combined with charcoal and sulphur in proper pro- portions becomes black powder. the most useful of the slow explosives for time fuses
 For high order explosives nitric acid is used for treating carbolic and sulphuric acids to produce the well-known picric acid. which is the basis of host of de- structive agents of tremendous power and intensity. such as dunnite. lyddite, mel finite. etc
 Nitrogen As
 Fertilizer.
 Tn the second Held of usefulness the manufacture of fertilizers. we again find nitrogen takinr the leading mart. Being part of the substance of plant tissua nitro gen is necessary to all crons. hnt in order to he useful. 1t must he in such n form that the plant can absorb 1t.
 The uncombined inert nitrogen of the a'- is practically useless to plant life. 1t ts only when transformed from the nasAors state of the atmosphere into a solid or l'unid compound fin the soil that the n'tro- gen is of any value to the growing p1ant.
 Nature performs this necessary trans- formation nv means of millions of mi crobes or bacteria. which take r,+rocnr
 
 while every flash of lightning "hxes" or transforms certain amount of nitrogen into nitric oxide for plant use.
 But nature's methods are far too slow for man. Tn few years rereated crop hing takes from the soil the nitrogen that is the product of centuries of natural proc esa
 Thus the use of nitroeennus fertilizers has come about. and for hundreds of years manure. ruano animal and vegetable mat ter. etc. have been employed.
 But the supply of these fertilizers has not kent pace with the demand and the cost of food products. which depend directly upon the yield per acre, anG therefore. un- on the supply of fertilizer, has been steadily advancing.
 Where Are We to
 Get Our Nitrogen?
 After years of the most painstaking in- vestigation. the only sources of any large supply of nitrogen have been found to he. first in ores; second, in coal or peat, and. third. in the air.
 There is but one place on the face of the earth that any great amount of nitro gen in ore is found to exist. Down in South America in the northern part of that mar row, ra1ness strip Of land In Chile that lies between the Andes and the Pacific are . found the nitre plains, the great natural source of fixed nitrogen. which occurs in the form of nitrate of soda or saltpetre. These plains are the principal source of revenue to the Chilean government, which fixes the price of nitrate and leves a GO l. per cent export duty. The deposits in Chile are limited in extent, and various estimates place their probable life at from twenty l. forty years. So it Is seen that this source is decidedly temporary in na- ture and is exposed to all the hazards of a long sea voyage.
 The second source of nitrogen is in the manufacture of coke from coal or peat. When coal is heated, certain of it's con- } pounds pass of as gases. When these gases ! are cooled and washed with water. the re-