Heavy inorganic chemicals industry

Next, let s look at some of the points made with respect to the heavy inorganic chemical industry at a similar meeting held in September,... 

The furnace acid and its salts account for about 85% of the use of white P. Heavy inorganic chemicals such as PCI3, P4O10 and P4S10 account for about another 12%, and all other industrial phosphorus compounds the remainder. The annual world production of white phosphorus declined considerably in the 1990s, but is still around 0.5 x 10 tons. 

The modern heavy (bulk) inorganic chemicals industry is described in the remainder of the chapter but at this stage it may be useful to look at the historical aspects of some of the processes. 

An important sector of heavy inorganic chemical manufacturing is the production of chlorine and sodium hydroxide — the chlor-alkali industry. The manufacture of these chemicals has a long history. Today they are produced simultaneously by the electrolysis of sodium chloride solutions, but this was not always the case. The two chemicals were originally manufactured by different routes. In the 19th century chlorine was made by the oxidation of hydrogen chloride (itself made by reaction of salt with sulfuric acid) using the Deacon process. Sodium hydroxide was prepared by the reaction of calcium hydroxide with sodium carbonate — the lime-soda process. 

Solvent extraction is used in nnmerons chemical industries to produce pure chemical compounds ranging from pharmaceuticals and biomedicals to heavy organics and metals, in analytical chemistry and in environmental waste purification. The scientific explanation of the distribution ratios observed is based on the fundamental physical chemistry of solute-solvent interaction, activity factors of the solutes in the pure phases, aqueous complexation, and complex-adduct interactions. Most university training provides only elementary knowledge about these fields, which is unsatisfactory from a fundamental chemical standpoint, as well as for industrial development and for protection of environmental systems. Solvent extraction uses are important in organic, inorganic, and physical chemistry, and in chemical engineering, theoretical as well as practical in this book we try to cover most of these important fields. 

Chlorination reactions are part of various processes in the chemical industry, to manufacture heavy chemicals, specialty chemicals, pesticides and pharmaceuticals, in inorganic and organic chemistry. They are a valuable tool in organic synthesis. 

An overview of the Swiss chemical industry would not be complete without reference to other branches of this industry. In most countries, in regions with home based textile industries, the heavy chemical industry developed right at the start of the nineteenth century, manufacturing acids and other inorganic substances for dyers, calico printers and bleachers. The same applied in Switzerland, but most of these plants disappeared around 1850 with the advent of the railway network local manufacture became obsolete as transportation costs went down. Only the Uetikon company, located on the east bank of Lake Zurich, survived as the most successful Swiss heavy chemicals plant. ... 

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