As it is now the lumberman wastes two-thirds of every tree he cuts down.
The rest is left in the forest as stump and tops or thrown out at the
mill as sawdust and slabs. The slabs and other scraps may be used as
fuel or worked up into small wood articles like laths and clothes-pins.
The sawdust is burned or left to rot. But it is possible, although it
may not be profitable, to save all this waste.

In a former chapter I showed the advantages of the introduction of
by-product coke-ovens. The same principle applies to wood as to coal. If
a cord of wood (128 cubic feet) is subjected to a process of destructive
distillation it yields about 50 bushels of charcoal, 11,500 cubic feet
of gas, 25 gallons of tar, 10 gallons of crude wood alcohol and 200
pounds of crude acetate of lime. Resinous woods such as pine and fir
distilled with steam give turpentine and rosin. The acetate of lime
gives acetic acid and acetone. The wood (methyl) alcohol is almost as
useful as grain (ethyl) alcohol in arts and industry and has the
advantage of killing off those who drink it promptly instead of slowly.

The chemist is an economical soul. He is never content until he has
converted every kind of waste product into some kind of profitable
by-product. He now has his glittering eye fixed upon the mountains of
sawdust that pile up about the lumber mills. He also has a notion that
he can beat lumber for some purposes.




VII

SYNTHETIC PLASTICS