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Show IL of U. Research Specialist Announces That Geneva Steel Should become One Of Potential Value The Geneva Steel company's $190,1)00,000 plant .should be rushed to full completion because of its immense potential value to the state and its Industrial economy, econ-omy, Dr. J. 11. Mahoney, University Univer-sity of Utah research specialist, tolVl Salt Lake Real Estate board members Wednesday at the Temple Tem-ple Square hotel, the Tribune said yesterday. As planned now, even with completion of thei structural shapes mill, upon which construction con-struction was halted several weeks ago by the war production board, the plant could not operate op-erate successfully on a peacetime basis, he said. With the addition, however, of facilities required for the manufacture manu-facture of tin plate used in making mak-ing tin cans and for producing flat' rolled sheets such as used in automobile bodies and refrigerators, refrig-erators, the plant definitely would be commercially successful in peacetime, he said. Dr. Mahoney estimated that coiling machines and other equipment needed for making tin plate and smaller flat rolled sheets would cost some $30,000,-000, $30,000,-000, definitely not an insurmountable insur-mountable obstacle. "Just to make the plant com- mercially marketable, it is conceivable con-ceivable that the government would install the additional facilities," fa-cilities," he said. The lessee or purchaser of the plant, on the other hand, if possessed of reasonable rea-sonable working capital, would not hesitate to expand that sum to make the venture commercially commercial-ly profitable, he declared. The speaker said-one-third of the nation's canning industry is I located in 11 western states, Alaska and Hawaii, which reasonably rea-sonably could be considered a marketing area for Utah steel. Tin plate for cans used in these states now is hauled from the Pittsburgh area, he said. "The demand for tin plate is increasing so fast that it would not be a question of taking business busi-ness away from existing plants, but of whether rolling and. coiling coil-ing facilities should be installed at the Geneva plant or elsewhere," else-where," Dr. Mahoney continued. He estimated there would be a demand for 500,000 tons of tin plate annually which could be supplied best from the Utah plant. Dr. Mahoney declared unequivocally un-equivocally that steel can be pro- j duced at Geneva at as low a cost as at any other plant in the country, which would .mean that the Utah plant would have an immense advantage in supplying the west coast. Pointing out that 95 per cent of all flat rolled steel in the country now is produced by the continuous process in self-integrated plants such as the one at Geneva, Dr. Mahoney said not only is the cost lower at such plants, but each unit is a specialized spec-ialized unit and therefore quality of the product is higher than at old type plants. The Geneva plant is the only continuous process pro-cess plant west of the Mississippi river, not excluding the new Kaiser company plant at Fon-tana, Fon-tana, Cal., he said. Meanwhile, three Russian engineers, en-gineers, members of a soviet purchasing commission, who i have been inspecting the Geneva : plant since Saturday, plan to j leave Salt Lake City Thursday ; evening. j A. Bronstein, interpreter accompanying ac-companying the group of engineers, engi-neers, said they had come here to familiarize themselves with technical details of the plant and that they were interested partic- I ularly in construction and building build-ing phases. "They did not come here to negotiate for purchase of any part of the Geneva plant," Mr. Bronstein said. Other members mem-bers of the group are P. V. Kouz-netsov, Kouz-netsov, A. N. Inanov and M. I. Antipov. I " |