Barilla plants

Soda as well as potash have also been made, since early antiquity, by burning weeds until only their ash remains - thus known as either soda ash or potash ash. The ash may also contain as much as 5% of sodium or potassium carbonate. Kelp, a large seaweed of the order Laminaria, and barilla plants, of the genus Salsola, which grow on many seashores, have... 

Historically, soda ash was produced by extracting the ashes of certain plants, such as Spanish barilla, and evaporating the resultant Hquor. The first large scale, commercial synthetic plant employed the LeBlanc (Nicolas LeBlanc (1742—1806)) process (5). In this process, salt (NaCl) reacts with sulfuric acid to produce sodium sulfate and hydrochloric acid. The sodium sulfate is then roasted with limestone and coal and the resulting sodium carbonate—calcium sulfide mixture (black ash) is leached with water to extract the sodium carbonate. The LeBlanc process was last used in 1916—1917 it was expensive and caused significant pollution. 

As demand for alkalis soared, more and more trees and plants were burned in Western Europe and North America. Each September, peasants along the coasts of Spain and southern France collected the highest quality alkali coastal barilla grasses impregnated with sea salt. The peasants dried... 

With very few exceptions, naturally occurring acids and alkalies are weak. All acids known in antiquity were of organic origin some occur in fruits, especially in unripe fruitjuices. Most ancient alkalies were derived from the ash of plants such as barilla, Salsola soda and Salsola kali (Russian thistle), and kelp. 

Near the end of the eighteenth century the difference between the two fixed alkalies—potassium and sodium carbonates—was known sodium carbonate barilla was largely made from the ashes of sea plants, and potash from the ashes of land plants. The Arabs also had brought some natural soda into Europe, via Spain. These sources were not sufficient to cope with the demand for alkali for the manufacture of soap, glass, etc. Potash was at that time the cheaper and dominant alkali. With the steadily increasing demands for alkali and the very limited sources of supply presented by the incineration of wood, many attempts were naturally made to substitute the base of common salt, because that with a suitable method of extraction nature has provided inexhaustible, abundant, and cheap... 

Potassa and Soda.—The alkalies used in the manufacture of common colored glass, such as thoso used for grecn bottles, are obtained, as far as the potassa is concerned, from common ashes, and tho soda from tho ashes qf eea-plants, or refuse soda. Better kinds of glass are made with crude potassa and soda-ash, and the best from purified potassa and soda-ash.. Not more than thirty years have elapsed since crown and sheet glass were manufactured from the crude alkali obtained from kelp, the preparation of which for. this purpose. employed a large population on the Northern shores of Scotland and West of Ireland, and the abandonment of this material, when the duty was taken off barilla,... 

Barilla An impure sodium carbonate made from the ashes of Salola soda and other salt water plants, Tormerly much used in making soap, glass, etc. 

Carbonate of soda, Na O, G O, - - 10 aq., forms very large rhomboidal crystals, which effloresce in the air. It was formerly extracted from kelp, or barilla, which is the ashes of marine plants but is now made from sea-salt, far more cheaply, and in a state of perfect purity. The salt, Na Cl, is first converted into sulphate of s(da, Na O, SO, by being heated with oil of vitriol. The sulphate of soda is now mixed with sawdust and lime, and heated in a reverberatory furnace. By this means the sulphuric acid is decomposed, its sulphur partly uniting with c cinm, and partly esc ing as sulphurous acid, while the carbonic acid which is formed unites with soda. The carbonate is purified by crystallisation, but generally retains a trace of sulphuric acid. 

Until the beginning of the nineteenth century the soda required for the manufacture of hard soap was obtained either from kelp (seaweed ash) or barilla, a plant ash mostly imported from Spain or the South of France. The alkali content of barilla was very variable. Parkes found that the best Spanish kinds contained from 10 to 20 p.c. of Na20 (one, exceptionally, 30 p.c.) kelp contained only i to 8 p.c. Stahl knew that the base of common salt was soda (see Vol. II, p. 681), and during the eighteenth century many attempts were made to obtain soda from common salt. The most promising approach was to convert the salt into sodium sulphate by heating with sulphuric acid. 

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