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In the early part of 1945, as the Allied armies advanced, German laboratories and plants became available for investigation. Since German development work had been hidden from the eyes of the world by the Reich’s national policy of secrecy, and by 5-1/2 years of war, it was obvious that much might be learned from such investigation. In particular, this was true in the synthetic-fuel industries deriving oil, gasoline, and a wide variety of chemicals from coal, for, owing to the scarcity of domestic petroleum. Germany had been forced into intense development of this program in contrast to the limited amount of similar development by the United States and Great Britain. Before the fighting ended in Europe, the United States and Great Britain organized teams comprising experts in all fields to investigate the research and industrial operations in Germany. The teams investigating coal, oil, gasification, and allied chemical fields included more than 30 American investigators and about an equivalent number of British investigators during 1945 and functioned with a reduced staff into 1946. German work in the synthetic liquid-fuels industries was on such a large scale that even such extensive investigation could not possibly cover the subject in all details. However, a great deal of information possible of direct application, and much information of a fundamental nature to help guide research work in this country for many years, was uncovered. Studies of the German industry are continuing, and it is hoped that gaps in the information that now exist will be filled in by future work.

The primary fields covered in the oil and synthetic-fuels investigation were concerned with petroleum refining and the gas-synthesis and coal-hydrogenation processes for producing oil from coal. The related fields of coal gasification, oxygen production, alcohol manufacture, lubricating-oil production, and the production of waxes and edible fats, as well as a variety of other chemicals, were an inherent part of the investigation.

This report indexes the data collected and microfilmed in Germany and other parts of Europe by the Technical Oil Mission, operating under the auspices of the Ministry of Fuel and Power for Great Britain and the Petroleum Administration for War and the Bureau of Mines for the United States. It is being published in accordance with the policy of the United States Government to make available to the interested public the results of the investigations of foreign research and industrial development.

W. C. Schroeder, Chief,
Office of Synthetic Liquid Fuels,
Bureau of Mines,
Washington, D.C.