Evening star., 1943-01-10

eept for the Butte area, virtually all of
the country's high-grade copper deposits
have been exhausted.
United States supply of copper reached
record high of 100000 tons in 1912
including 100000 tons imported from
South America and 100000 tons recov-
cred from scrap. This was still consid-
cred not enough, and 100000 tons in ad-
dltlon are demanded for 1943.
Apparently the compliment is paid to
enemy countries of supposing that they
can be defeated only with three times
as much equipment as their own. At
any rate, Chairman Nelson has an
nounced that attainment of present goals
would mean that by the end of l943
the United States alone would be out
producing the AXIS two to one, and with
its Allies would be outproducing the
Axis three to one"
Copper is one of the principal de-
flciency metals in Germany, which has
commonly used aluminium, of which it
had plenty, as substitute. Aluminium
Is a precious as copper in the United
States, and the only available substitute
in this country is the so-called Stacker
100000 ounces of silver, most of which is
buried in the ground at West Point, but
has thus far made only $4,000 900 ounces
available for war purposes-and this
under lease-lend arrangements by which
every gram must be restored
Therefore the use OF Government
owned silver has been restricted mostly
to bus bars in aluminium and magnesium
plants. Bus bars are main conductors
of electricity on distribution boards.
They can be removed intact when their
service is ended.
The demand for bus bars is limited.
1t appears certain that war industries
would absorb another billion ounces of
free silver held by the Treasury, in ad-
di ion to its monetary reserve, if only it
were permissible by law to dispose of
Government stocks for other than nom
consumptive uses. War agencies are per-
mitted to purchase foreign silver at As
cents an ounce, or 10 cents above the
level maintained by the Treasury. But
the supply, about 100,000,000 ounces a
year from Canada and Mexico, is made
uate for the demand.
Silver has qualities vesting it with high
potential value in war production. 1t Is
non-corrosive. 1t is superior to copper as
a conductor of electricity and to tin in
binding power for alloy soldiers.
Silver solder could be used by the air.
craft industry in the manufacture of oil
coolers, radiators, ignition systems, pipe
connections. instruments and fuselage
parts, and in the armament field, in re-
coil chambers of anti-aircraft cannon,
aerial and incendiary bombs, torpedo
tubes and the Jackets of machine guns.
In the construction, maintenance and
repair of ships, silver brazing alloys would
be suitable for joinging pipes and in re-
frigerator and conditioning equip
ment.
The Silver Paradox.
There exist at once large surplus and
an acute shortage of silver This para
dox is due to a small clan of Senators
who are known as the silver bloc" and
who have exhausted every device for
keeping their pet metal out of the war
Sinkings of bauxite ships from Dutch
Guiana and Brazil by enemy subma-
rines have compelled the United States
to become self sufficient in supplies of
this material, the basic source of alumni
mum, which is the one essential metal Of
aircraft production. 1t is promised by
No1c hot hxy q
United States will be completely inde-
pendent of foreign bauxite imports, and
that by September it will be able to sup
ply Canada's needs as we'll
Self -sufficiency has been gained at
cost of so frantic a pillage of the coun-
trvs sole bauxite resources that they can
last only two or three years at present
and prospective rates of consumption,
according to official estimates.
The situation would be desperate If 1t
were not for the fact that aluminium is
the most abundant metal in the earth's
crust, of which it forms 8 per cent. 1t
occurs in boundless volume in common
clay. The Bureau of Mines has made
laboratory experiments for the economi-
cal extraction of aluminium from clay,
but its experiments are described as
being little more than "nebulous." The
Tennessee Valley Authority has developed
one small pilot plant for this process,
and is said to have proved it to be COM
mercially practicable. The catch is that
aluminium made from clay requires four
times as much equipment as that eX
tracted from bauxite
known reserves of petroleum in the
ground throughout the United States
total approximately 100000 100000 barrels.
Since production is in the neighborhood
of 100000 barrels day, it is calculated
that national petroleum resources will
be exhausted in another IA years unless
they are replenished by the discovery
Of adequate new fields.
That the domestic petroleum industry
confronts problem Of mounting gravity
is shown by the fact that demand has
been multiplied by aircraft, tanks. mo-
torized equipment and the synthetic
rubber program, while production has
been on downward curve since 1878,
the latest two years in which discoveries
of new supplies exceeded Withdrawals.
Records of the IS biggest American fields
disclose that aggregate production, TAX
ing 1886 as base at 100 per cent, rose
to LOT in 1885, but fell to 81 in 1889 and
to IS in 194l Present and future decline
is o5t;.nated roughly at 10 per cent a
year.
The number of new wells brought in
since 1898 is probably greater than that