546.    [CHEMICAL TRADE JOURNAL AND CHEMICAL ENGINEER.]  Germany’s Oil Industry – Fischer-Tropsch Plants Not To Be Restarted.  Vol. 126, 1950, p. 984.

                 Regarding rumors that Fischer-Tropsch plants in the Ruhr were still producing despite the Allied ban, a high official of the American High Commission’s fuel and power branch reported that the last 2 plants working on the method had closed down Dec. 31, 1949, when a temporary allied production permit expired.  The North Rhien-Westphalian Economics Ministry has shown a cold shoulder to German industrialists’ hopes for reviving the industry.  While prices of basic materials, especially coke, had risen by up to 150%, sales prices for products had risen no more than 50%.  The price of catalysts was 3 times the prewar level, since the only West German plant producing the catalysts, at Oberhausen-Holten, was working at considerably reduced capacity.  Gelsenberg Benzin A.-G. at Gelsenkirchen and Union Rheinische Braunkohlen-Kraftstoff A.-G. at Wesseling are making petroleum from crude oil by the high-pressure Bergius hydrogenation process from German and imported crude oil.  Together they are expected to process 1,000,000 tons of crude oil this year and 2,000,000 tons by 1952.  No new plants operating on the Bergius process will be built in West Germany.  More cracking plants are planned.