Show CARBON BLACK BY electrical CRACKING the legislation in many states against the present method of producing carbon black by the incomplete combustion of natural gas and the continually increasing demand for gas for other purposes indicates that the supply of carbon black may gradually be decreased and that new methods for inn iia production utilizing a greater percentage of the carbon in the gas should be developed states the bureau of mines in serial 2417 recently issued in the course of the investigations of the effects of af hydrocarbons of high voltage discharges it was noted that under certain conditions natural gas could be decomposed and that carbon black could be produced the effects of several types of electrical discharges on natural gas gas have accordingly y been studied in order to find out the fundamental factors underlying the reactions reaction 5 and their possible influence in the recovery of a greater part of the carbon content of natural gas than is now possible present commercial plants using natural gas for the manufacture of carbon black recover from 08 to 16 1 5 pounds of carbon black per thousand cubic feet of gas consumed cons umed or less than 5 per cent of the total carbon in the gas it should be noted however that the present methods involve heating chegas the gas to incandescence by burning it as a lumi luminous noum flame and a considerable part of the gas is thus consumed as a source of heat if this heat can be supplied from some other source or if a more efficient method of applying the th energy contained contain edin in part of the gas to the decomposition of the rest of it can be worked out then a greater b yield of carbon black per thousand cubic feet of gas gascal can be expected jr |