Hamilton Castner

Infobox_Scientist
name = Hamilton Young Castner
birth_date = birth date|1858|9|11|df=y
birth_place = Brooklyn, New York
death_date = death date and age|1899|10|11|1858|9|11|df=y
death_place = Saranac Lake, New York
residence = United States, England
citizenship = United States
nationality = American
field = Chemist
alma_mater = Columbia University School of Mines
known_for = invention of methods to produce sodium metal and sodium hydroxide from soda ash and salt respectively

Hamilton Young Castner (11 September 1858 — 11 October 1899) was an American industrial chemist.

He was born in Brooklyn, New York and educated at the Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute, then at the Columbia University School of Mines. He left without a degree and in 1879 joined his brother, E. B. Castner, as a consulting chemist. He left this business around 1884 and worked to devise a process for manufacturing aluminium by reducing aluminium chloride with sodium. Sodium was relatively expensive at that time and Castner devised a process of producing it by the reduction of caustic soda with carbon, a much cheaper process. He failed to interest American industrialists and travelled to England in 1886.Williams, Trevor, I. (2004) 'Castner, Hamilton Young (1858-1899)', rev., "Oxford Dictionary of National Biography", Oxford University Press [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/37267] Retrieved on 9 March 2007]

In 1887 his process helped to lead to the formation of the Aluminium Company in England which produced aluminium of high purity. However in 1889 it was rendered obsolete by a much cheaper electrochemical process. Castner's only asset then was his cheap sodium and he worked to develop uses for this, including the manufacture of sodium peroxide, a bleaching agent, and sodium cyanide which was used in the gold mining industry.

In 1890 Castner devised a new method for producing very pure caustic soda by the electrolysis of brine in a rocking cell containing mercury. This process also produced the useful by-products, chlorine and hydrogen. When Castner came to patent his process he found that a similar patent had been lodged by Karl Kellner in Germany and that this had been made over to the Solvay Company in Belgium. In order to avoid litigation, Castner's Aluminium Company combined with the Solvay Company to form the Castner-Kellner Alkali Company and they built a large works in Runcorn, Cheshire. The Castner-Kellner process is still in operation in Runcorn today. [cite web |url=http://www.ineos.com/wor_man_eur.html |title=INEOS: Businesses |accessdate=2007-09-02 |publisher=INEOS Group ]

Castner suffered from tuberculosis and died, unmarried, in 1899 in Saranac Lake, Franklin county, New York state.

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