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Primed for Success: The Story of Scientific Design Company “More than a company history, Primed for Success is the story of the chemical industry in the United States. It is comprehensive in scope and detailed in its treatment—an essential read for anyone who studies the chemical industry or has been part of it.” —Thomas M. Connelly, Chief Executive Officer, ACS “Peter Spitz’ detailed and engrossing account of the rise of the petrochemical industry—which set in motion the building blocks of the modern industrial economy—captures how transformative the industry has been to not just economic development, but to so many aspects of modern life.” —Andrew N. Liveris, Former Chairman and CEO, Dow Chemical “Peter Spitz is opening up a new chapter in the history of the petrochemical industry that provides a lasting platform and remembrance of the great entrepreneurs of the industry. The new book should be very valuable for the new generation of chemical engineers as they recognize the vision and creativity of many courageous scientists and engineers.” —Werner Praetorius, President Petrochemicals (ret.), BASF Group “Peter Spitz delivers an essential history with Primed for Success. He details the inside story of a disruptive startup that invented the breakthrough technologies that would help usher in the petrochemical age. The book’s insights on entrepreneurship, successful innovation and the risks of overreach and hubris offer enduring lessons for today’s engineers and professionals as well.” —Robert Westervelt, Editor-in-Chief, Chemical Week “Ralph Landau was one of the giants of the chemical engineering profession. Both experienced and early-stage chemical engineers can appreciate how Ralph created a new business model as well as learn many lessons from his technical and business leadership.” —June C. Wispelwey, Executive Director, AIChE Peter H. Spitz Primed for Success: The Story of Scientific Design Company How Chemical Engineers Created the Petrochemical Industry 123 Peter H. Spitz Scarsdale, NY, USA ISBN 978-3-030-12313-0 ISBN 978-3-030-12314-7 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-12314-7 Library of Congress Control Number: 2019930157 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019, corrected publication 2019 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland This book is dedicated to a group of largely chemical engineers who worked at Scientific Design Company for periods between its founding in 1946 to the early 1980s, when its management took an immense gamble and effectively lost the company. Those of us who worked there will never forget the Camelot-like atmosphere that prevailed and allowed us to achieve extraordinary results. Foreword In 1948, as a recently graduated mechanical engineer, I joined Imperial Chemical Industries, the division of which, situated in North-East England, became known as Heavy Organic Chemicals Division. ICI, at that time, was wary of the new discipline—chemical engineering—which was beginning to flourish, mainly in the USA. The philosophy in ICI then being to recruit chemists, expecting them to pick up the rudiments of engineering, and engineers, expecting them to learn, on the job, some of the chemistry of the products and processes involved in their particular division of ICI. A very senior engineer, on a recruiting mission to the nearby university from which I was a graduate, came to tell those of us about to graduate, of the very high level of engineering involved in designing chemical processes, involving designing much of the equipment required, and having them built. All this was new to me, as was ICI, of which I had, until then, never heard. To underline his point, he invited me to visit an ammonia plant nearby. He and I walked and saw, in detail, the mile-long process, starting with the coke oven plant, to the ammonia reactors, designed to operate at two hundred and fifty atmospheres and requiring very novel engineering at that time. “There you are, young man” said my host at the end of the tour, “it is all high-quality engineering, except what goes through the pipes, and in the reactors.” I was hooked! What a transformation in the petrochemical industry then ensued! The plastics era took off. Hardly a month went by when there was not an announcement of a new plastic, or fiber, or a new and better process to make them, hitting the news. It was a very exciting time for the chemists, chemical engineers, and engineers of all kinds to be involved. Scientific Design Company was right in the middle of all this activity. It had found a unique niche for itself. ICI ended up having to license five processes from SD, because, even though ICI had a very large research program on products and processes, SD beat them to the patent office on five of the processes on which they were working! vii viii Foreword Chapter 7 of Peter’s book sets out very well why SD were more agile than most chemical giants of the time. ICI in the early 1950s eventually embraced the, then new to the UK, discipline of chemical engineering. One of the principal reasons, in my opinion, for SD’s success and rapid rise to become a major player in the petrochemical world was that the firm recruited, right from the start, very smart chemical engineers. They were an outstanding group of individuals who worked together to form a formidable team. Probably, only DuPont at the time could claim to have such a productive team of chemical engineers. I would add three other points to Peter’s Chap. 7 which applied to ICI. Perhaps some of these points applied to other chemical companies. • ICI set up a Corporate Laboratory wholly dedicated to “blue skies” research. This, in my opinion, tended the research departments of the ten ICI divisions to take their eye off the ball regarding a search for a better chemical route to the desired product. There grew a tendency to expect from corporate, but not divisional research, a new breakthrough. • There was little or no effort expended on the engineering process of the existing chemical route. This did not start, in earnest, until the main board of ICI sanctioned funds for the construction of a new plant. There is little time then to develop the engineering process, other than incorporating minor changes, because the urge was to build the new plant. • Also, there became in the UK, as well as at ICI, a wariness against new pro- cesses for chemical routes, because of troubles that arose in the many new nuclear power plants and ammonia plants being built at that time with untried processes. Peter Spitz, in this book, captures the fascinating story of SD and Halcon/SD, very accurately. The book is a comprehensive and well-written account of those transforming years of the petrochemical world, and the pivotal and unique role that SD played in it. It was not realistic of Ralph to think that Halcon could become a large operating company. Halcon did not have the necessary staff with the relevant experience to achieve it. Ralph had already achieved one of his goals, that of being renowned throughout the world. He should have been content with that. He became as well known and respected, worldwide, as his contemporaries at MIT, many of whom had become presidents of major oil and petrochemical companies. Peter’s book is a fitting tribute to the vision and entrepreneurship of Ralph Landau and Harry Rehnberg. London, UK Sir Robert Malpas, CBE Member, Main Board ICI (retired) Preface In the summer of 1956, I saw an advertisement in the New York Times for a position for a chemical engineer, posted by a firm I had never heard of: Scientific Design Company. At the time, I was a group leader at Esso Engineering, a division of Standard Oil Development Company. I had graduated from MIT with bachelor’s and master’s degrees and was convinced that chemical engineering would be my chosen profession. At MIT, I had been fortunate enough to have both Professor Warren K. Lewis and Edwin Gilliland as instructors. Lewis, in particular, had made a lasting impression on me. For the first seven years I designed and started up a number of petroleum refining plants and then felt I wanted to become more involved in petrochemicals, at the time in a high growth mode. I was interviewed by Ralph Landau, one of the firm’s founders, and shortly thereafter started to work for the company we would always refer to as SD.