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| Founded | 1921 [1] |
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| Headquarters | 330 South 4th Street, , |
| Parent | NewMarket Corporation [3] |
| Website | ethyl |
Ethyl Corporation is a fuel additive company headquartered in Richmond, Virginia, in the United States. The company is a distributor of fuel additives. Among other products, Ethyl Corporation distributes tetraethyl lead, an additive used to make leaded gasoline.
Founded in 1923, [4] [5] Ethyl Corp was formed by General Motors and Standard Oil of New Jersey (Esso). General Motors had the "use patent" for tetraethyllead (TEL) as an antiknock, based on the work of Thomas Midgley Jr., Charles Kettering, and later Charles Allen Thomas, [6] : 340–41 and Esso had the patent for the manufacture of TEL. Since the patents affected the marketing of TEL, General Motors and ESSO formed Ethyl Corp; each parent company had a 50% stake in the new corporation. Since neither company had chemical plant experience, they hired Dupont to operate the manufacturing facilities. After patents ran out, Dupont started manufacture of TEL on their own, and Ethyl started running its own operations.
Within the first year of its operation, the company’s plants were plagued by cases of lead poisoning, hallucinations, insanity, and even the deaths of its employees due to exposure to lead. While the company tried to hush the news, at times it was impossible, for example in 1924, within the first two months of its operation, the facility had 17 cases of severe lead poisoning leading to hallucinations and insanity, then five production workers died in quick succession, and 35 more turned into staggering wrecks at one ill-ventilated facility. [7] [4] : 194–5, 204–5
To counter these accusations, Thomas Midgley Jr. participated in a press conference to demonstrate the apparent safety of TEL on October 30, 1924, in which he poured TEL over his hands, placed a bottle of the chemical under his nose, and inhaled its vapor for 60 seconds, declaring that he could do this every day without any problems. In fact, he knew the dangers of lead poisoning, having been made seriously ill from overexposure a few months earlier. [4] : 195
The State of New Jersey ordered the TEL plant located at the Bayway Refinery in Linden NJ to be shut down a few days later, and Jersey Standard was forbidden to manufacture TEL again without state permission. [8]
In 1962, Albemarle Paper Manufacturing Company, in Richmond, borrowed $200 million and purchased Ethyl Corporation (Delaware), a corporation 13 times its size. Albemarle then changed its name to Ethyl Corporation. It is believed that General Motors sought to divest itself of "Ethyl Corporation," owing to concern about liabilities of TEL. The 1962 transaction was the largest leveraged buyout at that time.
During the 1970s and 1980s, the Ethyl Corporation expanded and diversified in response to the gradual decline of the market for TEL, as the automotive industry shifted to unleaded gasoline in response to the recently passed Clean Air Act, which effectively ended the use of leaded gas in new automobiles. [4] : 204 [9] In the late 1980s, Ethyl began to spin off a number of divisions. The aluminum, plastics, and energy units became Tredegar Corporation in 1989. In 1993, it spun off its life insurance company, First Colony Life, and then in 1994, the specialty chemicals business was spun off as an independent, publicly traded company named Albemarle Corporation.
In 2004, Ethyl Corporation became a subsidiary of NewMarket Corporation (NYSE : NEU).
Tetraethyllead has been recognized as a contributor to soil, air and water lead pollution, and is toxic to humans. While leaded gasoline made engines more efficient, lead pollution has increased by over 625 times previous levels in the past century due partly to pollution by leaded fuel. Ethyl Corporation historically denied that tetraethyllead poses significant public health risks in excess of those associated with gasoline itself.
Tetraethyllead was supplied for blending with raw gasoline in the form of "Ethyl Fluid", which blended tetraethyllead with the lead scavengers 1,2-dibromoethane and 1,2-dichloroethane. Ethyl fluid contained a dye which would distinguish treated gasoline from untreated gasoline and discourage the diversion of gasoline for other purposes, such as cleaning.
Thomas Midgley Jr. was an American mechanical and chemical engineer. He played a major role in developing leaded gasoline and some of the first chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), better known in the United States by the brand name Freon; both products were later banned from common use due to their harmful impact on human health and the environment. He was granted more than 100 patents over the course of his career.
Tetraethyllead (commonly styled tetraethyl lead), abbreviated TEL, is an organolead compound with the formula Pb(C2H5)4. It was widely used as a fuel additive for much of the 20th century, first being mixed with gasoline beginning in the 1920s. This "leaded gasoline" had an increased octane rating that allowed engine compression to be raised substantially and in turn increased vehicle performance and fuel economy. TEL was first synthesised by German chemist Carl Jacob Löwig in 1853. American chemical engineer Thomas Midgley Jr., who was working for the U.S. corporation General Motors, was the first to discover its effectiveness as an antiknock agent in 1921, after spending several years attempting to find an additive that was both highly effective and inexpensive.
Avgas is an aviation fuel used in aircraft with spark-ignited internal combustion engines. Avgas is distinguished from conventional gasoline (petrol) used in motor vehicles, which is termed mogas in an aviation context. Unlike motor gasoline, which has been formulated without lead since the 1970s to allow the use of catalytic converters for pollution reduction, the most commonly used grades of avgas still contain tetraethyl lead, a toxic lead-containing additive used to aid in lubrication of the engine, increase octane rating, and prevent engine knocking. There are ongoing efforts to reduce or eliminate the use of lead in aviation gasoline.
Charles Franklin Kettering sometimes known as Charles Fredrick Kettering was an American inventor, engineer, businessman, and the holder of 186 patents. He was a founder of Delco, and was head of research at General Motors from 1920 to 1947. Among his most widely used automotive developments were the electrical starting motor and leaded gasoline. In association with the DuPont Chemical Company, he was also responsible for the invention of Freon refrigerant for refrigeration and air conditioning systems. At DuPont he also was responsible for the development of Duco lacquers and enamels, the first practical colored paints for mass-produced automobiles. While working with the Dayton-Wright Company he developed the "Bug" aerial torpedo, considered the world's first aerial missile. He led the advancement of practical, lightweight two-stroke diesel engines, revolutionizing the locomotive and heavy equipment industries. In 1927, he founded the Kettering Foundation, a non-partisan research foundation, and was featured on the cover of Time magazine in January 1933.
Ethanol, an alcohol fuel, is an important fuel for the operation of internal combustion engines that are used in cars, trucks, and other kinds of machinery.
Ethyl tertiary-butyl ether (ETBE), also known as ethyl tert-butyl ether, is commonly used as an oxygenate gasoline additive in the production of gasoline from crude oil. ETBE offers equal or greater air quality benefits than ethanol, while being technically and logistically less challenging. Unlike ethanol, ETBE does not induce evaporation of gasoline, which is one of the causes of smog, and does not absorb moisture from the atmosphere.
Methylcyclopentadienyl manganese tricarbonyl (MMT or MCMT) is an organomanganese compound with the formula (C5H4CH3)Mn(CO)3. Initially marketed as a supplement for use in leaded gasoline, MMT was later used in unleaded gasoline to increase the octane rating. Following the implementation of the Clean Air Act (United States) (CAA) in 1970, MMT continued to be used alongside tetraethyl lead (TEL) in the US as leaded gasoline was phased out (prior to TEL finally being banned from US gasoline in 1995), and was also used in unleaded gasoline until 1977. Ethyl Corporation obtained a waiver from the U.S. EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) in 1995, which allows the use of MMT in US unleaded gasoline (not including reformulated gasoline) at a treat rate equivalent to 8.3 mg Mn/L (manganese per liter).
In the liquid fuel industry, oxygenates are hydrocarbon-derived fuel additives containing at least one oxygen atom to promote complete combustion. Absent oxygenates, fuel combustion is usually incomplete, and the exhaust stream pollutes the air with carbon monoxide, soot particles, aromatic and polyaromatic hydrocarbons, and nitrated polyaromatic hydrocarbons.
Bayway Refinery is a refining facility in the Port of New York and New Jersey, owned by Phillips 66. Located in Linden and Elizabeth, New Jersey, and bisected by Morses Creek, it is the northernmost refinery on the East Coast of the United States. The oil refinery converts crude oil into gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel, propane and heating oil. As of 2007, the facility processed approximately 238,000 bbl/d (37,800 m3/d) of crude oil, producing 145,000 bbl/d (23,100 m3/d) of gasoline and 110,000 bbl/d (17,000 m3/d) of distillates. Its products are delivered to East Coast customers via pipeline transport, barges, railcars and tank trucks.
Ethyl may refer to:
An antiknock agent is a gasoline additive used to reduce engine knocking and increase the fuel's octane rating by raising the temperature and pressure at which auto-ignition occurs. The mixture known as gasoline or petrol, when used in high compression internal combustion engines, has a tendency to knock and/or to ignite early before the correctly timed spark occurs.
Great Lakes Chemical Corporation was a chemical research, production, sales and distribution company that produced specialty chemicals used for polymers, fire suppressants and retardants, pool and spa water purification systems and various other applications. In 2005, Great Lakes merged with Crompton Corporation to become Chemtura. In 2017, Chemtura was purchased by LANXESS.
General Talking Pictures Corp. v. Western Electric Co., 304 U.S. 175 (1938), was a case that the Supreme Court of the United States decided in 1938. The decision upheld so-called field-of-use limitations in patent licenses: it held that the limitations were enforceable in a patent infringement suit in federal court against the licensee and those acting in concert with it—for example, a customer that knowingly buys a patented product from the licensee that is outside the scope of the license.
Innospec Inc., formerly known as Octel Corporation and Associated Octel Company, Ltd., is an American specialty chemical company. It comprises three business units:
NewMarket Corporation, is a publicly traded American company that primarily serves the petroleum additives industry. The company is based in Richmond, Virginia, and has operations in North America, Latin America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia Pacific. The company's predecessor, the Albemarle Paper Manufacturing Company, was founded in 1887.
Afton Chemical Corporation develops and manufactures petroleum additives, including driveline, engine oil, fuel and industrial additives. Afton Chemical Corporation is headquartered in Richmond, Virginia, and has operations around the world. The company is a subsidiary of NewMarket Corporation, a corporation specializing in performance specialty chemicals.
Robert Arthur Kehoe was an American toxicologist and a dominant figure in occupational health. Working on behalf of the lead industry, Kehoe was the most powerful medically-trained proponent for the use of tetraethyllead as an additive in gasoline.
Ethyl Gasoline Corp. v. United States, 309 U.S. 436 (1940), was a decision of the United States Supreme Court that limited the doctrine of the Court's 1938 decision in General Talking Pictures Corp. v. Western Electric Co. Beginning with the 1926 decision in United States v. General Electric Co., the Supreme Court made a sharp distinction between (i) post-sale restraints that a patentee imposed on purchasers of a patented product and (ii) restrictions (limitations) that a patentee imposed on a licensee to manufacture a patented product: the former being illegal and unenforceable under the exhaustion doctrine while the latter were generally permissible under a lenient "rule of reason." Thus, under the General Talking Pictures doctrine, a patent holder may permissibly license others to manufacture and then sell patented products in only a specified field (market), such as only a particular type of product made under the patent or only a particular category of customer for the patented product. The Ethyl decision held, however, that a patent licensing and distribution program based on both the sale of a patented product and licenses to manufacture a related product was subject to ordinary testing under the antitrust laws, and accordingly was illegal when its effect was to "regiment" an entire industry.
The history of gasoline started around the invention of internal combustion engines suitable for use in transportation applications. The so-called Otto engines were developed in Germany during the last quarter of the 19th century. The fuel for these early engines was a relatively volatile hydrocarbon obtained from coal gas. With a boiling point near 85 °C (185 °F), it was well-suited for early carburetors (evaporators). The development of a "spray nozzle" carburetor enabled the use of less volatile fuels. Further improvements in engine efficiency were attempted at higher compression ratios, but early attempts were blocked by the premature explosion of fuel, known as knocking.
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