Fritz Haber

Fritz Haber (1868-1934)

Fritz Haber was a German chemist in the early 20th century, one of number of very gifted scientists of that era.  Unfortunately, I believe that he used his considerable talents to further the rampant and murderous nationalism that consumed his era.  However, he was also the inventor of the Haber-Bosch process that the entire world depends on for fertilizer and ultimately food. 


His life was one of contradictions, coincidences, and tragedy.  His first wife, Clara Immerwahr, who was also a chemist, committed  suicide with Fritz's military pistol shortly after he returned from personally supervising the world's first military poison gas attack in Flanders, Belgium during WWI. Fritz had developed the poison gas used in the attacks. Their son, Hermann Haber also later committed suicide in 1946 after immigrating to the US.

The morning of Clara's suicide, Fritz left Berlin for the Eastern Front to supervise a gas attack on the Russians.  Otto Hahn, who along with Lise Mietner discovered fission, was a member Haber's unit in the gas troops.  To Hahn's credit, he later opposed the used of nuclear weapons.

Kaiser Wilhelm II gave Fritz the rank of captain for his service in WWI.  However, all his service for Germany and what would now be considered war crimes or genocide, were later insufficient for the Nazis, even though he had converted from Hasidic Judaism to Lutheranism to prevent his vilification at their hands.  Fritz had to flee Germany with his second wife and two sons.  Members of Haber's extended family died at the hands of the Nazis in WWII in concentration camps.


And here is my connection to Fritz Haber.  I visited a ghost town in Chile called Humberstone.  It was a major center of the nitrate mining industry until the Haber process and the Great Depression made it uneconomic and led to its abandonment in 1960.

Of course, there are many other coincidences in the life of Fritz Haber, only a few I have touched here.

This brings many questions to mind, one being why is high school history so boring?


I never learned any history like this in my public high school.  Perhaps if I had, it might have been less comatose inducing.

GEPocrisy

I wrote an blog awhile ago about the benefits of enhanced CO2 levels in greenhouses.  Of course, the benefits aren't limited to greenhouses, but apply to the whole world.  Elevated levels of CO2 increase the growth and vigor of plants.  What's not to like about that, unless you are a malignant Malthusian misanthrope masquerading as an environmentalist?

Anyway, I was researching gas turbines for electricity production for my city and ran across this from GE's website:

It says exactly what I did about CO2 enrichment for greenhouses:

CO₂ fertilization is suitable for nearly all plant types.

OK, we are on the same page here.  GE's system also can provide heating and return electricity to the grid as well as enrich the CO2 in the greenhouse.

But, here is where it gets interesting.  Another page on GE's site has this:

Carbon Capture & Sequestration!!  We can't have those evil greenhouse gases escaping into the atmosphere, where they could do the same thing they do in a greenhouse, improve plant growth worldwide!  Oh! Horrors!  That could lead to more abundant life for plants, animals, and humans!

The establishment has to invent "global warming" to scare us about greenhouse gases, then when the weather doesn't cooperate, they change the boogie man to "climate change"!


But, don't forget that essentially all life on this planet is carbon based and that carbon starts out in the atmosphere at 340 ppm or 0.034%, where it is fixed into plant matter by photosynthesis.  The whole food chain is limited by the tiny amount of CO2 in the atmosphere!


Burn more fossil fuel!  The carbon released to the atmosphere is a gift to the entire world, rich and poor alike, whether you fly to Davos to meet with the cognoscenti or live in the slums of Rio!

Double Bonus Nuclear Field Trip

A recent business trip took me to Huntsville, Alabama where I used the opportunity to do a little sightseeing between work obligations.


I called ahead to arrange a lunch meeting with Kirk Sorensen and Kirk Dorius of Flibe Energy, promoters  and developers of the Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor (LFTR).


They gave me their address and luckily it was close to my business location.  I couldn't find the suite, but I knew I was close when I saw this license plate in the parking lot.

I didn't end up having time for lunch, but I was able to chat with both Kirks for over an hour.  Kirk Sorensen started Flibe Energy to commercially develop LFTRs.  He also has a FB page and website, both called Energy from Thorium.  I recommend both to educate yourself about the benefits of thorium power.

L to R: Kirk Dorius, The Author, Kirk Sorensen

Great poster on the isotopes of the periodic table

The other part of the field trip was a visit to Browns Ferry Nuclear Power Plant, which is about 35 miles West of Hunstville and North of Decatur on the Tennessee River.

Of course, I couldn't really take any better photos than these, but at least I saw it.  This is the plant that was forced to reduce power during the heat wave last summer because the Tennessee River was a tenth of a degree too hot near the cooling outlet of the plant.  I guess some feddle gummint regulation came into effect.  (Or maybe it was just a conspiracy to burn more coal {wink, wink clean coal}, since the TVA had to purchase power from somewhere, most likely not nuclear to makeup the shortfall.)