The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, August 12, 1918, Page 14

How Nebraska Turns Brine Into Gold (Continued frém page 4) Burlington & Quincy railway will be tapped by these pipe lines.. - At first it was thought the water was the best yielder of potash, but experiments quickly showed that the muck in the bottoms of the lakes was equally profitable, and these lakes are now studded with pipes connected with pumps and lake levels have al- ready been greatly lowered in some instances. Some careful observers believe that when all the companies are in operation the potash resources now in sight will be greatly reduced in four years. The eight or nine big plants now building or already at work have a combined capacity of between 600 and 700 tons of crude potash a day. They pump and evaporate enough water to yield that many tons of the dried potash. Some of the plants yield 100 tons a day. This requires moving an immense quantity of water. In Jesse lake there are 1,200 wells or pipes “sucking water from its bottom in an area of 100 acres. It is estimated that it may be profitable to place as many as 50 wells on an acre in some of the lakes in order to bring up all the valuable material and leave nothing. Some of the plants are already bringing water from distances of 15 miles and more in pipe lines, and the pipe lines are being extended and more lakes being cornered by these operators. Of course, some of the lakes have water so weak in potash that they are not regarded as profit- able to work with present methods, especially as there are so many richer lakes easy of access. And yet, lakes yielding as low as 2 per cent solids and only 20 per cent of these solids potash, have been worked. Some of them yield from 12 to 84 per cent solids, and these solids in turn yield from 17 to 85 per cent potash. ; Some lakes that contain brine too weak to be attractive in summer are ADVERTISEMENT PROOF of Avery Tractor success is shown by the way Avery Tractor sales grow in the same community. When one farmer gets an Avery Tractor, his neighbors watch its work closely. !t is not long before another Avery arrives and then another, for his neighbors see that Avery Tractors stand up under the work. . Likewise, when an Avery gets into a family, other members of the same family soon become Avery owners. Brothers, cousins, fathers and sons, uncles. and nephews are buying Averys. We have many records of where two, three and four brothers in the same family’ have bought Avery Tractors. The fact that neigh- bors, friends and relatives buy Avery Tractors after they have watched carefully the work of the first Avery Tractor in their community or fame ily, is the very best proof that Avery ‘Tractors are a success. Power for Every Farm Need You can get an Avery Tractor to ex= actly fit your size farm. Avery Trac- tors are built in six sizes—a size for every size farm. ‘With an Avery Mo- tor Cultivator you can also cultivate your row crops ‘with motor power. You can also get a size Avery “Grain- Saving” Separator and Avery Plow for any size Avery Tractor. For any kind of field work, belt work or road work, there is a successful and profit- able Avery Motor Power Machine, e Mention the Leader When Writing Advertisers . . Built by Motor Farmi fl y Motor Farming The'five sizes of Avery Tractors, from 8-16 to 40-80 H.P., are all of the same design. They have lowspeed motors, renewable inner cylinder walls, ad- justable crankshaft boxes, gasifiers that turn kerosene into gas and burn it all, and many other original and exclusive features. Avery Tractors are built entirely in our own big factories and mwfl: of an Avery Tractor is built especially for tractor work- and only for the Avery Tractor, AveryCompany are bui —not assemblers, See the Nearest Avery Dealer Go to your Avery Dealer and get thd size tractor and equipment to meet the needs of your size farm. No mate ter how small or how large the acre- age you cultivate, Avery motor farme ing machinery will fill your require- ments, -Or, write for complete catalog; showing the Avery Line in natural colors, AVERY COMPANY, 6217 lowa St., Peoria, liL , Distril Service Stations in Every m73='3MM"wfir Gco‘Foni‘u Countries > ng Th‘resliitié pumped in winter when covered with™ a thick layer of ice. The freezing concentrates the minerals in the re- maining water, making it rich enough to be profitable. These are called “winter lakes.” Others that are too weak to work direct are pumped into. smaller lakes, where the evaporation rapidly takes off great quantities of water, leaving a brine so heavy that it can be very profitably pumped and finished by mechanical means. TIME FOR STATE ACTION As it is estimated that lake surfaces in this region will lose by evaporation as much as five feet of water over their entire surfaces in one year, it is not difficult to see how nature’s pro- cesses made rich reservoirs out of these lakes, and how manufacturers in turn by increasing evaporation can make huge and rapid profits. Some small operators still evapo- rate the water in large open vats ex-- posed to the sun and scrape up the residue afterward, but the most ap- proved methods are to boil the water £ PAGE FOURTEEN to a concentrated liquid and then - evaporate it by artificial heat. These are the plants that yield from 75 to 100 tons of the dried salts per day. One method of reducing these heavy liquors is- to squirt them .through faucets slightly inclined revolving cylinder 40 feet long, through which is shot a blast of hot, dry air. Shelves inside this cylinder scoop up the water, carry it part way to the top and spill it out through the blast of hot air time and time again until the moisture is gone and nothing is left but the clinkers of potash. These clinkers come tum- bling out in a steady stream at the lower end where the hot blast goes in, a veritable stream of gold. AIDED BY THE GOVERNMENT The scales or clinkers are then ground to the size of granulated sugar, and the ground material sacked and stored for shipment by the car- load. Most of the Nebraska potash up to this time has been used for fertilizer, but the beginnings of re- fineries are now being made and it is expected that the chemicals will be reduced to more costly form right at Antioch. To produce the large quantities now being turned out huge quantities of fuel are needed. The coal costs from $1 to $4 a ton at the mines in Wyoming -and with freight added * costs at the reduction plants at An- tioch and Lakeside from $3 to $6.75. It takes one ton of coal as fuel to dry the water from one ton of the potash salts. But while the fuel cost is from $3 to $6.75 the crude potash sells at $90 to $125 a ton. “When fuel oil is used instead of coal it requires 46 gallons of oil to produce one ton of potash and the oil costs from 7 to 9 cents a gallon, mak- ing the fuel cost per ton of potash between $3.25 and $4 a ton. With the war famine for potash, supplies cut off from Germany and the call for extra large crops in this country, the government has given preference to fuel oil and coal shipped from Wyoming to the Nebraska potash fields and everything is being done to facilitate the distribution®of the fin- ished product. > THE WORLD STARVES FOR POTASH But while Nebraska owns hidden millions in her potash wealth she has not awakened to the need for action of her own to conserve and develop for war use these necessary stores. There is scarcely any law in Nebraska statutes relative to potash or other mineral deyelopment. Such regula- tions as there are have been made by the commissioner of public lands and buildings and the state board of edu- cational lands and funds. ; These consist of leasing provisions - by which any one can lease Nebraska land for potash production by paying a royalty of one-eighth the price re- ceived. Permits to prospect. for lim- ited periods: over large areas are - given, but operators are not-allowed to- have more than one section for actual operation. They must show good faith and get busy, and if pro- duction continues: satisfactorily their lease is revived automatically as long - as production is profitable. ' ’ The board, in the absence .of legis- lation, has apparently safeguarded the people’s birthright fairly. -well but with theworld starving for potash and Nebraska owning large quantities easy to develop, her own people ought to insist upon the state setting up a plant, extending pipe lines and con- serving for Nebraska’s millions in- stead of for her millionaires, this - - wealth which nature has lavished upon her for this time of crigis, . . ‘Why should a few exploit these into ' the upper .end of a - - treasures and the masses plod on un< - v der a load of id so