AN IMPROVED METHOD OF AND APPARATUS FOR THE DEODORIZATION AND UTILIZATION OF SEWAGE
Year: 1874

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by William Robert Lake at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
23rd April 1874.-A communication from abroad by Leopold
Hesse, of Collins Street West, Melbourne, Victoria, Merchant.
I, WILLIAM ROBERT LAKE, of the Firm of Haseltine, Lake, & Co.,
Patent Agents, Southampton Buildings, London, do hereby declare the
nature of the said Invention for "AN IMPROVED METHOD OF AND APPARATUS
FOR THE DEODORIZATION AND UTILIZATION OF SEWAGE," a communication, to be
as follows:
The improved method of deodorizing and utilizing sewage, which,
forms the chief part of this Invention, consists, first, in distilling it,
and secondly, in providing some suitable ingredient for retaining the
valuable portion of the vapours given off from the boiler or retort.
I first agitate the material to be treated so as to make it all of the
same consistency, and then supply it to the retorts or boilers in sufficient
quantity and subject it to the action of heat until it boils. The vapors -
which are then given off I conduct through vessels containing some
suitable ingredient (say sulphate of iron) which will intercept and retain

page_text: the valuable portion of them, leaving the remainder valueless and
deodorized to escape.
The apparatus in which I conduct these operations consists of an
agitator working in a large reservoir, one or more boilers or retorts,
and a series of Woolf's bottles to cach retort. The reservoir is by
preference sunk in the ground, and built of brick cemented on the
inside. A pipe connects it with the retorts, which are by preference
made of iron, and heated in any convenient way, whilst a bent pipe
springs from the top of each retort and is connected with the first of a
series of Woolf's bottles.
The material to be treated is supplied to the said reservoir through
a grating or other suitable strainer for preventing the entrance of foreign
ingredients. When in this reservoir the agitator is set in motion to
bring the whole into a liquid of uniform consistency. When this is
done a cock is turned in the connecting pipe leading to the retorts
so as to allow of a sufficient quantity being supplied to them. Here
the liquid is agitated and boiled, and the resultant vapors are conducted
through the bent pipe or neck of each retort into the first of a series
of Woolf's bottles, in each of which is a certain quantity of sulphate
of iron. As the vapors pass through these bottles the ammonia and
other gases are retained by the sulphate of iron, leaving the residue an
innocuous and deodorized vapor to escape into the atmosphere.
I prefer to make the retorts of sufficient capacity to hold about seven
tons of liquid each, and I consider four tons a sufficient charge.
The Woolf's bottles I prefer to make large enough to hold four
hundred gallons each, and I charge each with thirty-two pounds of
sulphate of iron. Four, six, or eight may be used for each retort, the
thinner the liquid the greater the number required, but four will be the
standard. I continue to agitate and boil the contents of the retorts
until the same are reduced to a state barely moist and with scarcely
any vapor arising therefrom. I then allow the said contents to cool
and take the same out of the retorts; this is a fine manure. I next take
the contents of the Woolf's bottles and subject the same to mechanical
filtration, say through a blanket, and from this I obtain sulphate of
ammonia by distillation or evaporation.
The precipitate remaining in the filtering material consists of protoxide
and sulphide of iron which only requires to be dried, so that by this

page_text: process I produce a fine manure, and two other valuable products,
namely, sulphate of ammonia and a combination of protoxide and
sulphide of iron, whilst I destroy the noxious character of the material
treated.
In the event of the sulphate of iron being insufficient for the purpose
an additional quantity may be added through a tube provided for the
purpose. The insufficiency of the supply is at once notified by the
smell of the escaping vapor, and may also be ascertained by testing
the contents of the bottles with litmus paper. When the acid is entirely
neutralized more sulphate must be added.
Muriatic or carbolic acid may be used as a substitute for the sulphate
of iron, but the products are not so valuable.
Slacked lime may also be used in the first Woolf's bottle, sulphuric
acid in the second and third, and sulphate of iron in the fourth, if so
preferred. The product of the first bottle will then be gypsum, and that
of the remainder sulphate of ammonia. I prefer however to use sulphate
of iron in all the bottles.