In 1928 ICI acquired a forty per cent holding in BALM (now DULUX) and in 1929, under licence from DuPont, built a leather-cloth factory for the emerging furniture and car industries.

A major gap in Australia's manufacture was alkali. Sodium carbonate was needed for glass making, soap, wool scouring, flotation and water softening; sodium bicarbonate for flour; caustic soda for paper, textile, detergents, glycerine etc. When at the end of the First World War supplies of alkali ran out, the Government set up a committee under Sir Russell Grimwade to explore local manufacture. The investigation took some years and involved also a local ideas man, C. P. McPhail, and Sir David Rivett, Chairman of the CSIRO. The most appropriate route was the Belgian Solvay ammonia soda process. Ludwig Mond, founder of one of ICI's constituent companies, had recognised the merit of this revolutionary, but complex process at a very early stage and secured a cheap exclusive licence and developed the process further in the U.K. ICI Australia was therefore in a position to sanction a Solvay ammonia soda plant in 1935. Construction and start-up (1940) of the plant were major technical feats. Australian contributions were significant, particularly in the design of the salt crystallisation and harvesting system and engineering. This development, too was very timely; when war broke out the plant suddenly became vital to the economy. Over the years it was expanded repeatedly and yields were optimised; in the 1980s it produced close to 400,000 tones p.a.

17 Salt harvesting at Osborne, South Australia. The walking conveyor bet travels across the salt field. Solar drying of salt form the sea is probably Australia's earliest solar energy process.

Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering