IG Farben

[Kai Frederik Lorentzen]

On 21.11.2012 00:47, Erik T. Burns wrote:

> via that Metafilter convo (which was actually yesterday and didn't 
> develop into much) there are some amazing links, including to Sasuly's 
> book on IG Farben to much else on the Nuremburg war crime trials.
>
> right here:
>
> http://www.metafilter.com/122021/A-streaker-comes-across-the-stage-It-has-happened-before-but-there-is-nothing-to-compare-it-to-now#4695505 
>
>
> more on Sasuly, who is indeed mentioned by Weisburger in the 
> companion: http://www.thomaspynchon.com/gravitys-rainbow/extra/farben.html
>
>
>

 >> Because of buna rubber, strong links were established between IG and 
*Standard Oil Co. of NJ* (...)**.<<

/Frank Howard, the head of research at Standard, visited I. G.'s Leuna 
works in 1926. He was so impressed that he immediately fired off a 
telegram to Standard's president, Walter Teagle, then visiting in Paris. 
"Based upon observations and discussion today, I think that this matter 
is the most important which has ever faced the company since the 
dissolution," wired Howard. "This means absolutely the independence of 
Europe in the matter of gasoline supply." Teagle himself, alarmed about 
the possibility of losing European markets to the new synthetic oil, 
hurried to Leuna. The research and production facilities awed him: "I 
had not known what research meant until I saw it," he later said. "We 
were babies compared to the work I saw."//
//Teagle, Howard and other Standard executives hurriedly gathered at a 
hotel room in Heidelberg, ten miles from the I. G. Farben works. They 
concluded, Howard later recalled, that the hydrogenation process might 
be "more significant than any technical factor ever introduced into the 
oil industry up to the time." Here, in the laboratories of I. G. Farben, 
was a clear threat to the Standard's business. "Although hydrogenation 
of coal probably could never compete on an economic basis with crude 
oil," said Howard, "'the nationalistic factor' would lead to 
hydrogenation's being made the foundation of a protected manufacturing 
industry in many countries willing to pay the price." Thus, markets 
could be closed to imported crude oil and refined products; Standard 
could hardly afford not to become involved.//
//An initial agreement was therefore reached with I. G. Farben, which 
allowed Standard to build a hydrogenation plant in Louisiana. But by 
this time, the world oil shortage was beginning to turn into a surplus, 
and the American company's interest shifted. Hydrogenation could also be 
used on crude oil, to increase the gasoline yield. Thus, the new plant 
in Louisiana would experimentally apply the process not to coal, but to 
oil, in order to squeeze more gasoline out of each barrel of petroleum.//
//In 1929 the companies struck a broader agreement. Standard would have 
the patent rights to hydrogenation outside of Germany. In exchange I. G. 
Farben received 2 percent of Standard's stock - 546, 000 shares - valued 
at $35 million. Each company agreed to stay out of the other's main 
field of activity. As a Standard official put it, "The I. G. Farben are 
going to stay out of the oil business --- and we are going to stay out 
of the chemical business." The next step came in 1930, with the 
establishment of a joint company to share developments in the 
"oil-chemical" field. Overall, a good deal of technical knowledge was 
flowing to Standard. /

Daniel Yergin: The Prize. The Epic Quest for Oil, Money and Power 
(chapter 17)

In 1938 Germany - despite the Leuna product - had to import 90, 000 
barrels of oil daily; changing volumes came from Venezuela, Peru, Russia 
and Iran; 10, 000 barrels each were delivered by Mexico and Romania; the 
largest part - 25,000 barrels - came from the USA.

(see Daniele Ganser: Europa im Erdölrausch, p. 69)



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