Leblanc process (soda ash)
Proceso Leblanc (carbonato sódico)
- Date
- 1791 · confidence high
- Place
- Saint-Denis, near Paris, France
- Credited to
- Nicolas Leblanc
- People
- 👤 Nicolas Leblanc1742–1806
- Field
- Matter & energy
What it is
The first industrial process for obtaining soda from common salt, sulphuric acid, limestone and coal, replacing barilla and kelp ashes. It founded the heavy chemical industry.
The Saint-Denis factory was confiscated during the Revolution, and Leblanc took his own life in 1806; the process flourished in Britain.
What it led to
- The British heavy chemical industry (Widnes, St Helens, Tyneside)
- Cheap glass, soap and textiles
- Hydrochloric acid pollution and the first environmental law (the Alkali Act, 1863)
- The Solvay process as a replacement
Built on
- Hydrochloric acid1625
- lead-chamber sulfuric acid (Roebuck, 1746)
- Lavoisier's chemistry
- Academy of Sciences prize (1775)
Made possible
- Chlorine bleaching and bleaching powder1785-1799
- Solvay process (ammonia-soda)1861-1865
- Bleaching powder (chlorine by-product)
- Industrial environmental legislation