The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1916-07-20
Washington Gossip.
America Now Independent of the World
In Fertilizers.

America Now independent Vi the WIN
In Fertilizers.
WASHINGTON, July IT, 1916. The Euro
pean wars greatest service to the Unit
ed States. even surprising IN Importance
the stimulation to our foreign trade, has
been to force our scientists to develop
home resources for the renewal OF Amerl-
can soil fertility.
Until the war broke out, the United
States supposed itself to be at the mercy
of two great foreign monopolies in two
of the essential elements of fertilizer
nitrates and potash. The only natural
supply of nitrate salts on earth is in
Chile. Germany, at Stassfurt, possesses
the only potash mines on earth. Nitrates
and potash are two of the three indis-
pensable elements of plant food, the
other being phosphate.
To keep fertilizer away from a country
means starvation. Already the effects
of the fertilizer famine can be observed
| IN the European war. Germany has all
| the potash and nitrates she needs, but
she has no native supply of phosphate,
except the casual supply that comes from
stable refuse, nor have her scientists
been able to produce phosphate artificial
! ly. She has teen largely dependent for
her phosphate supply upon the deposits
| of phosphate rock in Florida and other
| Southern States. For two years she has
been shut off from this supply, and re-
| ed that last years German farm crop
was short. Scientists in Washington are
inclined to connect this shortage with the
i inability of German to get phosphates.
Without scientific resourcefulness, the
| United States might have found herself
i in Germany's predicament. But, with
scientific resourcefulness, we have now
abundant hons supplies of both elements,
not in mines and other natural deposits,
but in new chemical processes perfected
| by our own American scientists.
The government has taken the lead in
| this movement. What has been done
| toward giving US nitrate supply by
| "fixing" the nitrogen of the air in such
form that plants can feed upon it, is
we'll known. The government has ap-
propriated S15,00O,0O0 for nitrate
plant, and the supply of nitrogen in the
air is inexhaustable; it will last forever.
The greater miracle is the story of
how we have found potash, and found it
in abundance. The Geological Survey
has been boring and prospecting for pot
ash for more than ten years, but never
has a commercially workable potash sup
ply been discovered, although 1t is sup
! posed that the salts exist in our country.
But now, since the war started, we
have found our potash supply, and 1t is
not in mine or in the brine wells of the
salt works. Our scientists have discov-
cred more potash than we can use in the
arts and on the soil, eXhausting and
wasting as gas from the chimneys ard
stacks of our iron furnaces and lime
kilns.
The process by which this potash may
tie economically recovered was discover
ed by Prof. Cottrell. a scientist of the
government Bureau of mines. The Cot
trell process was originally intended and
used not to recover by-products but to
prevent gases destructive to vegetation
from issuing from factory stacks. AT
ter the war broke out and the price of
potash leaped skyward, a cement COM
the process to prevent the destruction of
vegetation by fumes from its stacks,
found this fue dust rich In potash. Since
then, scientists have made the startling
estimate that the recovery of the potash
from all the limestone burned for cement
will supply 40 per cent of all the potash
needed in this country.
The same process can be used to re-
lover the potash and other valuable
minerals in the gas which comes from
the iron smelter. Some striking facts
in the iron industry have been discovered
in the past few months. With potash at
present prices, it is now known that for
every SIT worth of fluid iron smelted
from the ore, potash worth 500 passes
away in gas and is wasted. Since the
recovery process is operated cheaply. it
is expected that the coming few months
will see scores of iron furnaces adopt
ing it. The furnaces can easily supply
60 percent of our potash needs.
Many OF our native rocks contain pot
ash in form that can be recovered by
the new process. 1t was because of our
development of nitrogen and potash sup
plies that Secretary of the Interior Lane
recently said: "You can now build a wall
around the United States and we can
live behind it for thousand years with
no serious disturbance to our industries
and without the sacrifice OF any of our
comfort and happiness.