The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1918-05-19

laboratory, where nltraIeS are lhao
| meal Nearly all of this went into
| fertilizer of the one kind or another.
| Indeed, the amount we spend for the
| nitrogen we use on our farms, taxing
all the products into consideration, Is
said to be about s75.000,00o per year,
and we might spend much more at
profit
1t is estimated that one pound of nitro
gen properly applied to the soil will in
7 crease the yield of wheat by one-third.
| 1t is one of the most important elements
| of the balanced fertilizers of today, and
| it is largely due to it that the countries
| of northern Europe get SO much more
out of their land than we do. BY means
of it Germany has increased its average
yield per acre of all crops several times
as much as we have. Indeed, we can
not get along without nitrates in our
| manufacture of fertilizers, and they are
of an enormous Importance to the food
supply of the present.
We need many thousands of tons OF
nitrogen for our military explosives. We
need vast quantities in our chemical in
| austries, and >also in the ammonia neces-
! sary for our refrigerating plants of one
| kind or another. All of the fresh food
| that goes across the water is carried i'll
cold storage chambers. which are cooled
| with ammonia, and the same is true of
! Tire COoliHS plants OIL the meat packing
| industry In short, we must have hun
| dreds of thousands of tons of fixed nitro
| gen every year, and at present about
| half of all we use comes from abroad
and mostly from Chile. The supply is
| deficient, and we shall need all we can
make for sometime in the future.
I have travelled through the Chilean
nitrate fields and have watched them
tul L. ft,cr a,rf h. -. 49,
OH ships to be sent to our country. The
nitrates come from the great desert
which lies between the Pacific ocean
and the Andes mountains. The country
there IS as barren as the Sahara. 1t
has not blade of grass or any green
thing. and in parts of it you would have
| to go 100 miles for a drink 1t is all
rock, stone and sand, with here and
there beds of salty particles that reflect
the rays of the sun, inflaming the eyes.
IL is TINS salt when extracted that forms
| the nitrates of commerce. There are
| great beds of 1t in the desert. They run
north and south for distance of about
| 400 miles, beginning below Antofagasta,
| from which most of the nitrate is
| shipped, and extending beyond the port
| of Iquque, which is not far from Peru.
| Both ports are in Chile The belt. in
| which the nitrate deposits lie is confined
| to that country 1t is from 20 to LOO
| miles back from the coast, and it is sell
| dom more than 10 miles in width
| Nevertheless, that strip of desert sand
| is one OF the most valuable strips OF
land upon earth Within the past gem
! GRAFTON it has paid Chile in export du-
| ties alone several hundred million dol
lars IN gold, and today it brings in about
| four-fitths of all the government ex-
| penses and also yields fortunes to the
| men who are working it. The bulk
| of the exports are controlled by Ameri-
| can and British capitalists Before the
war began we were taking about one
! fiftn of the product and our imports last
year were over 100000 tons Our nitrates
are loaded at Antofagasta, from where
| they come northward about 2400 miles
| to the Panama canal and thence to the
| United States ports. When shipped tine
nitrate of soda looks just like dirty
| white salt. 1t is put up in bags of 200
| pounds each, and is carried out to the
steamers in lighters.
| 1t is interesting to watch them mine
nitrates. The salts are not evenly dis
tributed. They lie in pockets. and there
| is a single bed that covers an area of
100 square miles. The stuff is mixed
with other rock, and the best of the
deposits contain only from 40 to 60 per
cent of pure nitrate. AS general thing
| the nitrate lies close to the surface, with
\
is gotten out by putting a hole down
| through this sand and salt rock and on
| through the nitrate rock to the soft earth
| beneath. This hole is now charged with
| powder and the rock blasted out. The
powder is often made on the spot from
the same material as that found in the
| hole. After the rock has been taken out
it is broken into Jumps, crushed by ma
chinery and boiled in great tanks of
water. In this boiling the -alts go into
! the water and turn it to thick, lemon
4 like syrup. The water is now taken off
Iby evaporation and the nitrates allowed
to settle. They are then dried and ready
for shipment to US at prices as high as
the traffic will bear.
4 And now as to the source of these
| Chilean nitrates. The nitrogen we shall
make for the future is to come from the
| air. The nitrates from Chile are sup
| posed to have come from the bed of an
| inland sea which once covered this part
! of the desert. There is nitrogen in sea-
weed, and some believe that the nitrates
| came from it when it decayed. Another
theory is that they are the salts of the
ammonia which rose from the vast beds
| of guano formed by the birds on the
islands of the west coast, and third
| that they were made from the air by GER
| tain electrical discharges in the Andes
mountains which SO combined with the
| air as TO make nitric dctu, the dtlu uc-
ing deposited in these beds in the form
| of nitrate of soda.
None of these theories is satisfactory,
but the last one is based upon much
the same principle as those now applied
| in the arc process of getting nitrates
from the air.
1 The atmosphere which is all about
us and which extends for miles over
lour heads is mixture of two gases,
nitrogen and oxygen. More than three
ifourths of it is nitrogen and this nitro-
gen contains all the values of the stuff
we are importing from Chile at a cost
lof millions of dollars per year. Ac-
cording to DR.. Charles +. Monroe, the
4 eminent chemist and expert on explo-
sives, there are 33,sS0 tons of nitrogen
in the air over each acre OF ground.
There is so much that few thousand
acres has a blanket above 1t, which
i contains more nitrates than is now left
in the desert of Chile. There is so
lmuch right above us that IL we could
fwall in the atmosphere over 20-acre
lfeld and extract the nitrate we should
have enough to supply the army and
navy with all the nitric acid it needs
for explosives, give our farmers all
their heterogeneous fertilizers and the
Refrigerator plants sufficient ammonia.
and still have enough eft for our other
industries of every description.
This nitrogen is floating around free
lin the air with it's little sister named
- .v,A MT h n 10