IMPROVEMENTS IN THE TREATMENT OF URINE AND LIQUID SEWAGE IN ORDER TO FIX THE AZOTE AND PHOSPHATE SUBSTANCES CON- TAINED THEREIN AND CONVERT THEM INTO SOLID MATTER, AND IN APPARATUS FOR THE SAME
Year: 1874

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by William Spence at the Office of
the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 14th July
1874. A communication from abroad by Emile Seraphin Joseph
Forgeois and Victor Louis Claye, both of Paris, France.
I, WILLIAM SPENCE, of 8, Quality Court, Chancery Lane, in the
County of Middlesex, Patent Agent, do hereby declare the nature of
the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE TREATMENT OF URINE AND
LIQUID SEWAGE IN ORDER TO FIX THE AZOTE AND PHOSPHATE SUBSTANCES CON-
TAINED THEREIN AND CONVERT THEM INTO SOLID MATTER, AND IN APPARATUS FOR
THE SAME," (being a communication to me from abroad by Emile
Seraphin Joseph Forgeois, and Victor Louis Claye, both of Paris,
France), to be as follows:-
The modes of treating urine containing more or less of solid fecal
matter coming from sewers hitherto employed in order to fit such
matters for use in pasture, or to extract from them the azote and
phosphates which they contain under different forms, have been slow.
in operation, and have required extensive and costly apparatus to effect
the separation of the solid fecal matter from the urine.
Now this Invention has for its object the treat ment of these matters
in such a manner as to convert the azote and phosphate substances

page_text: rapidly into solid matter by the use of more simple apparatus than has
hitherto been employed for the purpose.
And the Invention consists in taking the urine and sewage as it
comes from the sewers or elsewhere, and (without filtering) pouring
it into large receptacles of wood lined with lead. These receptacles have
cach a double bottom with a space between the two bottoms, and the
upper bottom being of copper. A coil of pipes is inserted in such a
manner that the half of the pipes are above and the other half below
the copper bottom. These receptacles are arranged so that each suc-
ceeding receptacle may be at a lower level than the preceding one,
and they are made to communicate one with the the other.
The material to be treated is introduced into the first receptacle,
and there is added some acid having an affinity for the ammonia
(usually sulphuric acid) in quantity proportioned to the amount of
alkaline substances in the material under treatment, and the mixture
is stirred for a short time either by an attendant or by a mechanical
agitator. When the acid has thus come in contact with all the liquid
sewage, and has fixed by taking up the alkaline substances and
transformed the phosphates of lime into phosphoric acid, steam is
admitted so as to bring the material by heat to the required con-
sistency, when it is passed into the second receptacle which is warmed
by steam from the first one. In this second receptacle the material
acquires increased consistency, and is passed into the third receptacle.
The product thus obtained contains in a fixed but soluble state all
the azote and the phosphorus contained in the liquid sewage in the
natural state. It is a greyish, light, friable material, portable and
easily used, containing from eight to twelve per cent. of azote, and
two to five per cent. of phosphoric acid, containing only the richest
manure or material adapted for compounding with other kinds of
manure.
It is not necessary to bring the material to a state of complete desic-
nation. it may if mun