Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1938 [PAGE 92]

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9o

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

[October 26

1. A recommendation that the Board authorize applications for two new patents in the United States and in Great Britain on "a process for the recovery of sulfur dioxide from waste gases" to be designated as Johnstone and Singh, case 3 and 4. T h e modifications contemplated which necessitate additional patent protection a r e : "Briefly, the modification consists in treating the effluent solution with zinc oxide by which the original alkalinity of the absorbent is restored and the sulfur dioxide is precipitated in the form of zinc sulfite. T h e solid material is then filtered from the solution, the filtrate being returned to the scrubber in a cyclic manner. T h e zinc sulfite is then decomposed by calcination at a relatively low temperature producing gaseous sulfur dioxide and the zinc oxide which continues in a secondary cycle. Complete details of the process have been described in a Progress Report dated June I, 1936, to the Utilities Research Commission, copies of which were filed with the Director of the Engineering Experiment Station. Since this report was made, a pilot plant has been operated and the preliminary estimates, at least, partially substantiated." 2. A recommendation that the Board release to G. Frederick Smith, Associate Professor of Chemistry, the right to apply for a patent covering a design of apparatus for use in potentiometric titrations. T h e Committee is of the opinion that the discovery is of no public interest or concern, and that its commercial possibilities are entirely nominal, so that the University would not be justified in expending money for patent applications. 3. At the meeting of the Board on June 29, 1936 (Minutes, page 797), the Board of Trustees Committee on Patents recommended that a certain proposal be made to the Imperial Chemical Industries Limited, of England, which is interested in securing a license to use the Johnstone process for the recovery of sulfur dioxide from flue gases. T h e Board requested its Committee and the Faculty Committee on Patents to give this matter further consideration. T h e r e were certain points at issue, namely, the claim of the Utilities Research Commission under its contract with the University that it has control of the foreign patent situation, and also the Commission's objection to the provision in the recommendations of the Committee on Patents providing for the payment of royalty to the University on sulfur dioxide of ten cents per ton in one instance when the sulfur dioxide is not utilized as a raw material for the production of sulfur compounds of commercial value, and in the other instance of fifty cents per ton when the sulfur dioxide is used for the production of sulfur compounds of commercial value. T h e Committee is of the opinion that it is not important to the University whether any royalty payments made to it, through the commercial development of the discoveries covered by the patent, are paid directly by the British company, or through the Utilities Research Commission. T h e Committee, therefore, recommends that the first paragraph in the recommendation? of June 29, 1936, be amended by stipulating that any licensing by the British company by whomsoever done shall insure the protection of the public interest which the Committee believes it to be the duty of the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois to consider and to which reference is hereafter more fully made. T h e Committee further recommends that paragraph number 3 ( a ) be amended to read as follows: " W h e n the sulfur dioxide is not utilized in any way as a raw material for the production of sulfur compounds of commercial value no royalty shall be charged." It is observed that the Committee suggests the elimination of the royalty of ten cents recommended last June. T h e Committee further recommends that paragraph 4 of the recommendations of June 29 be stricken and that there be substituted for it the following: "The University and the Utilities Research Commission jointly agree to exchange data with the Imperial Chemical Industries Limited, on laboratory and test results relating to the problem of removing objectionable dusts, vapors, and gases from industrial gases before ejection into the atmosphere." In making the foregoing recommendations the Committee does not intend to abandon its position formerly taken respecting the asserted right of the Utilities Research Commission to control foreign patents under its contract.