Word: glycerine
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Dates: during 1940-1940
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Whale oil, unfortunately for whales, is especially valuable in war. It is a cheap source of fats for soap and margarine, and baleen whales yield glycerin for explosives. In World War I, up to 1917, Britain bought 660,000 bbl. of baleen oil for $185 a ton (normal: $120-125 a ton). At that time blockaded Germany was paying $1,500 a ton for such oil as she could get. This time, Britain contracted to take all the Norwegian oil for margarine. Next autumn, whether Norway is German-dominated or not, her great fleet of whaling ships will...
...P.E.T.N." is the short name for pentaerythritoltetranitrate, an explosive made from formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, nitric acid. It appeared as a laboratory curiosity during World War I, is no more destructive than standard military explosives, but has the great advantage that no glycerin is needed to make it. In Cincinnati it was reported that Germany, which is short of glycerin, is using P.E.T.N., if not for military purposes, at least for industrial uses, and so releases more of the glycerine explosives for use in shells, bombs, torpedoes, mines, depth charges...