Evening star., 1932-03-30
COTTONSEED OIL
TURNED INTO GAS
New Process Yields VeritabIe
Pandora's Box of
Products.
BY HOWARD w. BLAKEsLEE,

NEW ORLEANS, March 30.-Making
high-grade gasoline instead of salad oil
out of cottonseed is chemistry's latest
addition to the list of potential motor
fuel sources.
The process for converting cottonSeed
oil into anti-knock gasoline was de-
scribed to the American Chemical So
c1ety today by DR.. Gustav Eglof of
Chicago.
The present cost of 35 to 40 cents a
gallon is too high to make cottonseed
gasoline competitor with established
commercial products in this country.
The cottonseed oil IS run through a
metal coil ct a temperature Of 900 de-
greeS Fahrenheit and a pressure of $50
pounds per square inch. This breaks
down and rearranges the atoms form
ing the oil so that the oil yields a
Pandora'S box Of unexpected products.
First comes little more than so per
cent of gasoline. Next emergeS a heavy
fuel for Diesel engines. After that is
coke for the furnace. Then there are 13
difference gases, some of them COM
mercially valuable Last of all comes
water-which is all that is left Of the
original cottonseed oil. This water is
the only waste product.
IlcluS AtcOnOt, 100
Furthermore, DR.. EgIoff said, good
alcohol can be obtained from certain of
the cottonseed vaporS. Likewise a
widely sold variety of anti-freeze mix
ture for automobile radiators. Adding
a little. sodium produces rubber-ltke
substance. g
There are potential uses for this
kind of an apparatus, DR.. Eglof said,
in ~ lnC xYyl1n &c
cheap, for the apparatus can use
other products than cottonseed oil
equally well. 1t will crack" with
equal ease vegetable oils, fish oils such
as are abundant in Japan, shale oils
and coal tar oils.
A new improvement for the petro-
leum industrys problems Of separating
the various grades Of gasolines, oils
and gases was reported by DR.. M. Il.
FenSke of Pennsylvania State College.
This process is called "fractionating.
He credited the work to development
of ideas originally advanced by DR.. w.
K. Lewis of Massachusetts, Institute of
Technology under the name of key
componentS."
The result obtained by DR.. Fenske's
apparatus is like considering the liquid
within it as being a rod of wood. Down
in the middle of this rod is substance
which the oil man wants. Formerly
he had to cut off the top Of the rod
and keep whiting it down until he
reached the section desired. BY
Fenskes method he can treat the liquid
column as If it were a rod and saw
out the section wanted.
Calculations Accurate.
Mathematics is an important part of
this process, as it enables the refiner to
calculate the results accurately enough
to obtain exactly the ingredients sought.
The Laboratory of Animal Nutrition
of Cornell University contributed a dis
covery that certain dried fish has higher
food value If dried in vacuum than If
dried by flame heat. These experiments
were made by DR.. L. A. Maynard and
A. v. Tunison. The inferiority of flame
heat was found due to its higher tenn
perature injuring the proteins The ex-
periments were made on haddock and
menhaden, both widely used as fish
neal for hog and poultry feeding
"Since these products are used pri-
marily for the purpose of supplying pro-
tein in the ration" the report stated,
"the practical importance of the find
ings Is obvious. There is also some ap-
plication to human nutrition In fur
niShing evidence for the general propo-
sition that high temperatures lower the
nutritive efficiency Of protein"