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Show Geneva Converts Smoke to Nitrogen Fertilizers for Farmers Where there's smoke here's not necessarily fire! Research chemists have found ways to capture one particular typa of smoke and change it into fertilizers and in the process have established a common bond between Utah coal miners and Utah farmers. Smoke from Utah coal is helping help-ing to produce three high-strength high-strength nitrogen fertilizers at a new Nitrogen Plant near Provo, Utah. First of its kind at a major American steel mill, the plant is located at U. S. Steel's Geneva Works. The fertilizers are derived, as are many thousands of other chemical compounds, from the captured black fumes given off during the coking of coal. Marketed under the USS Nitrogen Nitro-gen Brand, the three "coal" fertilizers'ammonium fer-tilizers'ammonium sulfate, an- hydrous ammonia and ammonium nitrate will be ready for use by Utah farmers this spring. In the usually nitrogen-poor western soils, farmers have found that these nitrogen-rich fertilizers increase their yields at low cost. They offer a variety of services tailored to the individual farmer's farm-er's needs. Anhydrous ammonia is stored as a liquid and injected into the soil under pressure as a colorless gas. The gas adheres to clay particles par-ticles in the soil and as the soil warms up, changes into nitrate nitrogen which can easily be taken ta-ken up by the plants. This conversion con-version process allows the release of nitrogen over a longer period. Prilled ammonium nitrate is -particularly effective for crops that require nitrogen in both the ammoniacal and nitrate forms. Applied in either The fall or spring, it stimulates vigorous growth and develops healthy and green plants. In addition to its growth-stimulating characteristics, characterist-ics, it increases the protein content con-tent of forage crops, with resulting re-sulting gains in meat production. The third fertilizer, ammonium sulfate, is advantageous because its acid residual effect offsets the alkaline nature of most western soils. The presenoe of sulfur in ammonium sulfate can be a advantage ad-vantage on sulfur-deficient soils because it provides increased growth and helps maintain dark green color in plants. The fertilizers are only part of the infinite variety of fantastic chemical compounds (that scientists scien-tists have discovered may be produced pro-duced from coal chemicals. They link together not only Utah farmers far-mers and miners, but complete the cycle back to vegetation in huge prehistoric swamps which formed the coal we use today. |