California, southern

Department of Chemistry University of Southern California Los Angeles, California... 

Large deposits of monazite (found on the beaches of Travancore, India and in river sands in Brazil), ahanite (in the western United States), and bastnasite (in Southern California) will supply cerium, thorium, and the other rare-earth metals for many years to come. 

In the fall of 1976 I had a call from a friend, Sid Benson, who, after a decade at the Stanford Research Institute, just returned to the University of Southern California (USC) in Los Angeles. He invited me for a visit, telling me about USC s plans to build up seleeted programs, ineluding chemistry. I visited USC and found it, with its close to downtown urban campus, quite different from the sprawling expanse of the eross-town eampus of UCLA, whieh I had visited on a number of oe-... 

Environmental Aspects. Airborne particulate matter (187) and aerosol (188) samples from around the world have been found to contain a variety of organic monocarboxyhc and dicarboxyhc acids, including adipic acid. Traces of the acid found ia southern California air were related both to automobile exhaust emission (189) and, iadirecfly, to cyclohexene as a secondary aerosol precursor (via ozonolysis) (190). Dibasic acids (eg, succinic acid) have been found even ia such unlikely sources as the Murchison meteorite (191). PubHc health standards for adipic acid contamination of reservoir waters were evaluated with respect to toxicity, odor, taste, transparency, foam, and other criteria (192). BiodegradabiUty of adipic acid solutions was also evaluated with respect to BOD/theoretical oxygen demand ratio, rate, lag time, and other factors (193). 

Aldehydes are important because they are temporary reservoirs of free radicals (see eqs. 11 and 12). HCHO is a known carcinogen. Nitric acid is formed by OH attack on NO2 and by a dark-phase series of reactions initiated by O3 + NO2. Nitric acid is important because it is the second most abundant acid in precipitation. In addition, in southern California it is the major cause of acid fog. 

Fig. 11. Distance methanol-fueled transit coaches traveled per year of operation in the Golden Gate Transit District (GGTD) Riverside Transit Agency (RTA), Southern California Rapid Transit District (SCRTD) and Q Orange County Transit District (OCTD).

Owens Lake. Owens Lake is a relatively small alkaH deposit in Southern California where small amounts of cmde trona are recovered and sold (30,31). Several feasibiHty studies with regard to expanding production at this site have been conducted over the years with negative results. 

G. A. Olah and V. P. Reddy, University of Southern California, 1991, unpubHshed results. 

George A. Olah V. Prakash Reddy G. K. Surya Prakash University of Southern California... 

E. C. Hohmann, Optimum Netiporksfor Heat Exchange, Ph.D. dissertation. University of Southern California, Los Angeles, 1971. 

Coal Slurry Pipelines. The only operating U.S. coal slurry pipeline is the 439-km Black Mesa Pipeline that has provided the 1500-MW Mohave power plant of Southern California Edison with coal from the Kayenta Mine in northern Arizona since 1970. It is a 457-mm dia system that aimuaHy deHvers - 4.5 x 10 t of coal, the plant s only fuel source, as a 48.5—50% slurry. Remote control of slurry and pipeline operations is achieved with a SCADA computer system. In 1992 coal deHvery cost from mine to power plant was calculated to be 0.010/tkm ( 0.015/t-mi) (28). 

The first solar-electric technology to arouse industry interest was solar-thermal energy (1,3,5,6,8). Under favorable circumstances, it can be cost-effective, as evidenced by the fact that solar-thermal gas-hybrid plants produce over 350 MW of commercial power in southern California. This power is used during peak demand to supplement that available from conventional generation. 

The pioneering 10-MW Solar One plant in Barstow, California, produced the most successful central receiver tests. The plant was funded primarily by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and operated by Southern California Edison Company in the early to mid-1980s. EPRI provided technical evaluations of the experiment. The general conclusion drawn from Solar One and other experiments was that further substantial engineering development was needed. 

Based on the results of the Solar One plant. Southern California Edison formed a consortium that included DOE and EPRI to constmct a Solar Two Project. Solar Two will convert the idle Solar One central receiver plant from a water/steam system to a molten salt system, thereby improving efficiency and operating performance. With the molten salt technology, solar energy can be collected during the day and stored in the salt to produce electricity when needed. The three-year demonstration is scheduled to begin in late 1996. 

Alternatives to oxychlorination have also been proposed as part of a balanced VCM plant. In the past, many vinyl chloride manufacturers used a balanced ethylene—acetylene process for a brief period prior to the commercialization of oxychlorination technology. Addition of HCl to acetylene was used instead of ethylene oxychlorination to consume the HCl made in EDC pyrolysis. Since the 1950s, the relative costs of ethylene and acetylene have made this route economically unattractive. Another alternative is HCl oxidation to chlorine, which can subsequently be used in dkect chlorination (131). The SheU-Deacon (132), Kel-Chlor (133), and MT-Chlor (134) processes, as well as a process recently developed at the University of Southern California (135) are among the available commercial HCl oxidation technologies. Each has had very limited industrial appHcation, perhaps because the equiHbrium reaction is incomplete and the mixture of HCl, O2, CI2, and water presents very challenging separation, purification, and handling requkements. HCl oxidation does not compare favorably with oxychlorination because it also requkes twice the dkect chlorination capacity for a balanced vinyl chloride plant. Consequently, it is doubtful that it will ever displace oxychlorination in the production of vinyl chloride by the balanced ethylene process. 

In some places and under certain conditions, freshwater can be obtained more cheaply by desalination of seawater than by transporting water. This is tme when all the costs of extremely large monetary investments in dams, reservoirs, conduits, and pumps to move the water are considered. Before the rapid escalation of fuel costs between 1973 and 1980, the cost of desalination of seawater to adequately supply southern California would have been less than that of transport to the Peripheral Canal. This would have been the case even if there were an unlimited supply of water in the mountains of northern California, a condition that does not appear to exist. It has been shown that before 1973 a seacoast town could have been suppHed with 7-12 x lO" /d of freshwater more cheaply by desalination than by damming and piping water a distance of >160 km km (7). Indeed, the 1987—1992 drought in California has compelled the city of Santa Barbara to constmct a water desalination plant, and a 76,000-m /d plant is plaimed for the western coast of Florida (8). 

Pinal Air Quality Management Plan, 1982 rev.. South Coast Air QuaUty Management District and Southern California Association of Governments,... 

Economic Aspects. Table 13 summarizes prices and shipping methods for the principal borate products as of January 1991. Within the United States most shipments are by rail, and additional charges are made for spHt cars, tmck shipments, palletized shipments, etc. Prices are fob Southern California. In general, the borates are stable soHds and require no special handling techniques with the possible exception of dust collection. 

In 1982, Texaco started up a 900 t/d gasifier at Southern California Edison s Cool Water faciUty. This was the first coal gasification plant to operate in an electric utihty environment, providing coal gas as fuel to a GE-frame 7E combustion turbine. The Cool Water gasification plant operated for over... 

There are two general geothermal resourees, dry (steam) fields and wet (brine) fields. More than 800 MWe is being produeed from sueh dry geothermal steam fields in Northern California. The wet fields usually eannot be used in this manner and Rankine eyele-type systems, ealled binary plants, are being eonsidered at sueh loeations. At the wet fields found in the Imperial Valley of Southern California, the geothermal fluid is a 250°C brine, whieh does not lend itself for use in eonventional steam turbines. 

De.m, R. S., and Swain, R. E., Report submitted to the Trail Smelter Arbitral Tribunal, U.S Bur. Mines Bull. 453. U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC, 1944. PiiKoedings of the First National Air Pollution Symposium, Pasadena, CA. Sponsored by thi- Stanford Research Institute in cooperation with the California Institute of Technology, University of California, and University of Southern California, 1949. 

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