INDUSTRIAL ALCOHOL—DENATURED ALCOHOL The term "denatured alcohol" is applied to alcohol intended to be used for industrial purposes, which is so treated as to render it unfit for use as a beverage. Pure alcohol is used extensively for mixing with other beverages, such as whisky, brandy and rum. It is much cheaper than any of these and can be used in large quantities without the consumer being aware of it. It is this par ticular use of alcohol which denaturing is intended to prevent.
In the manufacture of neutral spirits there is separated in the process of distillation 10 to 15 per cent of the total volume of the distillate which it is found impossible to purify so highly as to make it suitable for the mixing purposes above stated. It is, however, of a character which renders it easily prepared for drinking by those who are not particular respecting the kind of alcohol which they consume. In the trade this product is known as "alcohol," and is a lower grade of the more refined article known as neutral spirits. Heretofore this article has been sold for industrial purposes and for the preservation of specimens, subject to a tax of one dollar and ten cents on every proof gallon or about two dollars on every wine gallon of alcohol of 95 per cent strength. It is this pro duct which it is proposed to use for industrial pur poses under the existing law permitting its sale free from tax when sufficiently denatured as to be un suitable for consumption.
Preparing denatured alcohol.
Industrial alcohol is derived from a number of sources. In this country it has been made chiefly from corn, in Germany it is made principally from potatoes ; in France it is made chiefly from sugar beets and beet-sugar and molasses. It may be made, however, from any material which contains sugar or starch, and nearly all plants contain both. Alcohol is also distilled from wood. Wood alcohol is an entirely different kind of alcohol, but is a real alcohol, the same in chemical classification as that derived from corn and sugar. For example, saw dust is treated with an acid under pressure which converts it into dextrose, and this dextrose is subsequently fermented, producing with proper distillation a pure ethyl alcohol.
The alcohol which is made for industrial purposes, after it is produced by fermentation of any of the substances mentioned, is separated by the processes of distillation and purifying and concentrated by the processes usually employed for making alcohol and neutral spirits. Under the Revenue Law, alcohol
of this character may be denatured in bonded ware houses by adding to it such substances as are approved by the Commissioner of Internal Revenue. For general purposes alcohol is denatured by means of wood alcohol, or wood spirits, and benzine, which is one of the varieties of coal-oil products. The wood alcohol is added at the rate of ten gallons per hundred, and the benzine at the rate of one half gallon per hundred. Wood alcohol may be used with pyridin bases in the following propor tions : To each 100 gallons of alcohol of not less than 180 proof, two gallons of wood alcohol and one-half gallon of pyridin bases. Alcohol thus treated is said to be denatured for general pur poses, suitable for burning in lamps to produce illumination, in stoves for heating and baking, in engines for driving automobiles, and in certain in dustries in the preparation of varnishes and veneers. There are many uses of an industrial character, however, to which alcohol treated in this way could not be put. The law, therefore, permits special denaturing agents for special purposes, and the Commissioner of Internal Revenue establishes, from time to time, special forms of denaturing.
As an example of special denaturing the method of treating alcohol for the manufacture of tobacco may be cited. To each one hundred gallons of alcohol there is added one gallon of the following solution : 12 gallons of an aqueous solution con taining 40 per cent nicotine, A- pound acid yellow dye (fast yellow), pound tetrazo brilliant blue, and sufficient wafer to make 100 gallons. It is seen by the above regulation that alcohol to be used in the manufacture of tobacco is denatured principally with nicotine, which is a poisonous alkaloid natur ally existing in tobacco. The addition of this nico tine in connection with the coloring matters is sufficient warning to the intending drinker that the material is not fit for consumption.