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Between 9:25 a.m. and 10:00 a.m., the 4000-volt circuits in two substations at the Union Carbide plant about a half mile downwind from the stack were shorted out. Power was restored in these substations by 2:00 p.m. A third substation nearby shorted out at 5:15 p.m. on the same afternoon. Startup of this substation was delayed until the following day pending an inspection of temporary repairs. Eight other open air substations and a metering station at the plant which were downwind from the stack did not short out. A newspaper account in the Fostoria Review Times on May 12, 1972, reported the Union Carbide power failure and also quoted a spokesman for the Ohio Power Company as indicating that three or four power outages were reported in the city at 9:10 a.m. The Ohio Power Company spokesman also said failures occurred within 15 minutes of each other at Ohio Power's east end substation, which is adjacent to the Union Carbide plant, and its west end substation which is some 3 miles to the west (downwind) of the plant. A power outage was also reported on Saturday, May 13, 1972, from 1:25 p.m. to 3:17 p.m. which darkened most of the downtown area of the city east of Main Street. Ohio Power's east end substation adjacent to the Union Carbide plant was reported as losing six 4000-volt line insulators.

E. Interests of the United States Government

There is a considerable range of Federal interest in the widespread use of graphite composite materials and potential hazards therefrom. Composites may offer the transportation industry the only economically viable means of meeting the automotive fuel consumption standards established for the 1980's. Composites now integral to a number of key aeronautical and space systems being developed and procured by the military and civil agencies of the Government; in certain cases (F-18, Space Telescope), the mission objectives cannot be met without its use.

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Composite materials are of growing importance to the entire national industrial economy as they find use in many different applications; they offer an improvement in performance and weight in comparison to the metals they replace. The Federal responsibilities for the public welfare encompass the full range of the possible threats posed by graphite fiber release, including environmental protection, human health, public safety, and degradation of such basic services as power and communications. Federal responsibilities for informing the public as to the positive and negative implications of new developments may not be explicit in every case but are nonetheless real, especially in light of the Government's dual promotional and protective interests. Considerable foreign use is being made of graphite composites and a significant amount, both as raw material and in finished consumer products, is being imported by the United States.

Federal R&D programs, notably within NASA, have focused on expanding the use of composites in the civil aviation field; Federal procurement programs, notably within the military, have specified these high-performance, lightweight materials; and Federal automotive fuel consumption standards virtually require conversion from present metals to new lighter materials. The role of the Federal Government, therefore, has included both the promotion of economically and socially beneficial new materials and the protection of the society from deleterious side effects.

III. PRESENT PRODUCTION AND APPLICATION

A. Production

Worldwide production capacity of carbon fibers was over 900 tons in 1976, and will probably be more than 1,500 tons in 1977. The industry as a whole, however, was operating at only about 40% of full capacity in 1976 with total sales of about 300 tons. Six of the leading carbon fiber producers accounted for about 80% of the world capacity and about 85% of the total carbon fiber sales in 1976. Producers of significant quantities of carbon fibers are listed in Table 1, along with estimated production capacity and some sales statistics. Marketing experts are currently predicting more than a 400% increase in the worldwide carbon fiber demand and production by 1980. Such increases will depend, in part, on further development of lower cost continuous, high-modulus, pitch-based graphite fibers; the utilization of carbon fiber technology in the automotive industry; the availability of Government aerospace and defense contracts; and the ability of producers to reduce the price of PAN-based graphite fibers below $10/lb.

B. Applications

The consumption of carbon and graphite fibers in the free world, by the general industrial and sporting goods industries, accounted for over 75% of the total output in 1976, with the remainder being consumed primarily by military and aerospace applications. By 1985, all sectors of the industry will be consuming larger volumes of carbon fibers with the automotive industry expected to consume a sizeable fraction of the total. Applications of carbon fibers in the aircraft and aerospace industries will continue to increase, especially in the area of structural load-bearing applications. Significant carbon fiber applications are listed in Table 2. There are over 250 fabricators using carbon fiber materials in the United States alone and probably as many more in the rest of the world. Hundreds more may be attracted to the field in the next 10 years as the market expands.

IV. POTENTIAL USAGE

A. Projected Military Usage

Of materials technologies which have emerged during the past ten years, the graphite composite technology appears to have the most significant across-theboard impact on future military systems. For this reason, the military is projecting the use of graphite fiber composites in virtually all new aircraft being considered. Table 3 lists these aircraft along with the anticipated weight and location of the graphite fiber components. Of the aircraft listed, two are worthy of special note.

The Navy F-18 aircraft is being designed for extensive use of graphite fiber composites. The use of this relatively large amount of graphite fiber composites will enable this aircraft to achieve mission and performance capability that could not presently be obtained with any other carrier-based aircraft designed without the extensive use of composites. Similarly, the VTOL aircraft, AV8B, is dependent on the use of large amounts of graphite fiber composites to provide this aircraft with adequate range and payload.

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'Firms that reported 1976 capacity did not report in 1977

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Table 2

APPLICATIONS OF CARBON AND GRAPHITE FIBERS

Structural components for commercial airlines

Antenna for Jupiter flyby satellite

Equipment section for third stage of TRIDENT missile

Space Shuttle cargo doors

Rocket motor combustion chambers and nozzle components

Access doors, empennage parts and speed brakes for fighter aircraft

Helicopter tail boom

Sporting goods, such as: fishing rods, shafts for golf clubs, CB antennas, tennis racket frames, javelins, bats, hockey sticks, etc.

Experimental automotive parts, such as: drive shafts, spring leaves, side intrusion beam, bumper parts, frame rails, valve trrain pushrods, gears, bearings, brake linings

Lightweight oil field derrick

Textile equipment

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