Abstract
THE situation of Great Britain as regards a due supply of potash is again attracting attention, and the present moment may be looked upon as opportune for briefly reviewing its leading features. Potash is one of the essential requirements of a country like our own; it is used in many ways, mainly in various branches of chemical industry, in glass manufacture, and in agriculture, its application in the last-named being by far the most important. Thus it has been estimated that in 1913 the world's consumption of potash (calculated as K2O) was about 1,000,000 tons for agricultural purposes, as against 135,000 tons for all other purposes. Before the war this consumption was supplied entirely by Germany, chiefly from the mines situated in Germany proper— namely, Stassfurt, Brunswick, Hanover, etc.— and to a much smaller extent from the mines in Alsace, then subject to Germany. All these mines were in German hands, controlled by the Potash Syndicate, which deliberately limited the Alsatian output to 5 per cent, of the total, in order to protect the very large capital that had been invested in the North German potash mines. In 1913 the consumption of potash fertilisers (in tons of K2O) was as follows:—
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The Potash Position. Nature 107, 321–322 (1921). https://doi.org/10.1038/107321a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/107321a0