The gazette-times. [volume] (Heppner, Or.) 1912-1925, 1922-12-21
WASTE WOOD WILL
NOW Be VALUABLE
Head Of University Chemistry De-
Dartment Has Perfected Process
to Obtain Products Used in NJ
merOus Basic Industries.

OHlNtIaltg VI OItBon man hhab euAhiNo
of practical use in the Pacific North
west and elsewhere, became public
today in the announcement that Prof.
0. F. Stafford, head of the University
chemistry department, has perfected
a process for utilizing waste wood to
obtain a superior grade Of charcoal
and wood distillation products used
in a number of basic industries.
Because Of the great amount Of
cheap waste wood material available
in the Northwest, it is believed that
| the lumber industry and other en-
terprises will be keenly interested in
Prof. Stafford's success. Heretofore
it has not been commercially prac-
ticable to utilize mill waste in the
carbonization and wood di~stillation
industries.
Prof. Stafford first demonstrated
his process scientifically. The Uni
versity campus was the scene of the
early experiments. He and the firm
of engineers behind him have now
succeeded, after several years labor,
in demonstrating it as a practical
commercial process. Two wood dis
tillation plants on the Atlantic Coast,
one of them controlled by a big cor
poration, placed every at
Prof. Stafford's disposal, and the sue
cess of the progress was completely
demonstrated.
By the Stafford process a fine grade
Of charcoal can be obtained as well
as the usual by-products of carboni-
cation, acetic acid, acetone and wood
alcohol, basic in the manufacture of
such articles as dye, paints, var
nishes, celluloid, smokeless powder
and artificial leather. A considerable
amount of charcoal is used in the
chemical industry; for example, in
case hardening steel. Bagged char
coal is consumed extensively in many
large cities. Charcoal briquets are
in demand as fuel. The Pennsylvania
Railroad is making use of briquets
made by the Stafford process.
Cord and slab wood have been the
accepted material used in making
charcoal and its by~-products. As
| small waste wood Is materially cheap
err than either slab or cord wood, the
desirability of utilizing it in car
bonization operations has long been
recognized. Eight hundred applica-
lions have been made at various times
at the Patent Office by those who
thought they had hit upon a process
| of carbonizing small waste wood on
a commercial scale, The failure Of
these efforts, up until the Stafford
process was proved successful, have
been due, in general, to heavy costs
Of installing and maintaining the
complicated mechanical appliances
required.
Following his preliminary expert
mental work, Prof. Stafford set up a
| semi-commercial scale apparatus
near the campus in the summer of
1917 and got results from his opera
tions. The following Fall he took up
with the National Research Council
the matter of getting aid for further
work, but before action was finally
secured, E. R. Badger & Sons Co,
Boston, chemical engineers and man
| uf~acturers of chemical equipment.
made q proposal to back up further
preliminary experiments.
In the summer Of 1918, Prof. Stat
ford went East on a leave of absence
from the University. He directed
the work of practical demonstration
in a plant having a daily capacity of
100 cords erected especially for the
tests in Cambridge, Mass, by the
firm of engineers, The entire per-
| sonnet of the Badger organization
was always available and, in addition,
Prof. Stafford had his own %organiza-
ton of workmen.
The outcome at Cambridge was so
successful that a large manufactur-
ing corporation utilizing ~by-products
Of the c%arbonizing industry was in
terested. In 1920 the work was con-
tinled in a plant of 200 cords daily
capacity at K~ingsport, Tenn. The
plant had originally been erected by
the National Research Council during
the war for chemical experimental
ton. The special equipment neces-
sary to continue demonstrations Of
the Stafford process vas installed in
this plant.
The commonly accepted practice of
carbonization is to place cord or slab
wood in large oven retorts made of
steel plate. Fires in the furnaces
beneath are started. Vapor outlets
from the ovens are provided, these
outlets leading to condensers for the
recovery of the liquid products of
the distillation. The charcoal is
withdrawn after the wood has been
carbonized.
The retort used in the Stafford
process is a cylinder, t~hirty-two feet
high and nine feet in diameter. The
cylinder is set vertically and the ap-
pliances are such that the wood to
be carbonized is fed continuously in
to the top, while charcoal is with
drawn from the bottom. A remark
able feature of the process is that no
heat is applied to the cylinder after
the process once is started, the car
bonization of the wood being spon-
taneous under the conditions which
the Stafford invention maintains.
Until the Stafford process was de-
veloped the principal difficulty en-
countered in the use of small waste
wood has been that of transmitting
heat to the interior Of a mass of
finely divided woody matrial in the
retort. Such a mass is a poor con
ductor of heat, Only the portions of
it in contact with the hot walls of
the retort can in any reasonable time
reach a %carbonizing temperature. The
numerous attempts to handle such
material have had to do principally
with overcoming this difficulty.
The Stafford method depends upon
an entirely new principle, Before
Prof. Stafford began his experiments,
the wood used in carbonization work
has always contained moisture. Prof.
Stafford experimental with perfect
ly dry wood. He found that when
the dry wood is heated under his
process to the %tmperature at which
the charring begins the carboniza-
ton went along to completion with
Ing any right, title, estate, lien or
interest therein, and for such other