ducers to undersell U.S.-made syn­thetics easily, the industry contends.

Armed with detailed briefs—more like market studies than legal docu­ments—the Man-Made Fiber Produc­ers Association presented its case against tariff cuts to the U.S. Tariff Commission and the Committee for Reciprocity Information in Wash­ington week before last. Both bodies are hearing industry's views to prepare for tariff-cutting negotiations that be­gin next month in Geneva under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.

For the Man-Made Fiber Produc­ers Association, attorney Eugene L. Stewart showed CRI and LI SIX" com­prehensive data on the world market and capacity for synthetics. His client's concern, he said, is with the world-wide increase in synthetic fiber capacity by 1961. Including that of the Communist nations, world capacity will be something like 10 billion pounds annually—in celliilosics and noncellulosics together.

Mr. Stewart pointed out that sev­eral European countries (United King­dom, Austria, Belgium, France, and the Netherlands) will not be negotiat­ing with Japan at Geneva because they did not consent to Japan's be­coming a member of GATT. Any con­cessions those countries might grant will not benefit Japan. However, the U.S., which did consent to Japan's Gx\TT membership, will bargain with Japan and with the European produc­ing nations. Any U.S. concessions made for the benefit of the European countries will also open the door wider to imports of synthetics from Japan. This means that Japan will be unable to sell any large amount in Europe, leaving the U.S. as the only big market available to Japan's synthetic fibers.

That U.S. imports of noncellulosics have increased almost geometrically, from 700,000 pounds in 1956 to 6.5 million in 1959, proves that present tariffs are no bar to imports, Mr. Stew­art argued. With foreign capacity increasing as it has been, the potential injury to U.S. producers is serious, he contended. He asked the U.S. Tariff Commission to take the stand that re­ducing synthetic fiber tariffs would stimulate imports to the serious injury of the domestic industry.

For rayon staple, U.S. producers went further to petition for a return from the present 15Cv to the original 25r/r tariff. The Rayon Staple Pro­ducers Association—American Viscose,

RAYON TARIFF. Attorney Kenneth C. Royall asked tariff hike for rayon staple

American Enka, Bigelow-Sanforcl, and Courtaulds (Alabama)—says its mem­bers are now operating staple plants at a loss. The association gave USTC and CRI confidential information to support its claim. With operation at 55 to 60'f of capacity, it says, cost of production is below the present price of 28 cents a pound. Imported rayon staple, much of it from Europe, now supplies about 20'<- of the U.S. market.

Most alarming to U.S. staple pro­ducers, said Kenneth C. Royall, RSPA counsel, is the potential threat posed by Japan, which has enough excess capacity to supply the entire annual consumption of the U.S. In April and May of this year, about 672,000 pounds of rayon staple arrived here from Japan.

RSPA, said Mr. Royall, wants the U.S. negotiators at Geneva to with­draw the tariff concessions on rayon staple that were granted in 1948 and 1951 when U.S. demand exceeded do­mestic capacity. This could be done, he said, under a provision of GATT without the uncertainty, delay, and expense involved in an "escape clause" action before the Tariff Commission.

State Department officials say the RSPA request is getting serious con­sideration. However, they point out that the U.S. has generally shied away from withdrawing concessions, believ­ing that the escape clause affords ade­quate remedy for industries injured by imports.

RSPA's request that the Tariff Com­mission not start an escape clause in­vestigation, however, involves the

commissioners in a legal dilemma. RSPA's evidence indicates that im­ports are causing serious injury. When such evidence turns up during the hearings preparatory to tariff ne­gotiations, some lawyers believe, USTC is required to begin an escape clause investigation on its own motion under a new provision of the Trade Agreements Act.

Mystery Gas Remains A Mystery First reports of the mystery gas that caused nausea and other discomfort to about 40 people in La Porte, Tex., Aug. 12 may have caused more dam­age than the gas itself. As various in­vestigations and a court of inquiry got under way last week, the exact nature and source of the gas remained un­known.

Managers of chemical plants near La Porte (about 25 miles east of Houston) say that no noxious gases escaped from their plants and that plant employees neither smelled nor were affected by any gas.

Dr. Walter A. Quebedeaux, air-water pollution control director of Harris County (which includes Hous­ton and La Porte), says he thinks the gas was phosgene. Dr. Quebedeaux bases his opinion on medical reports and the fact that the wind was blow­ing from the southwest. Details of the Pollution Control Office's report were being withheld at press time un­til the court of inquiry convened Aug. 19 in La Porte.

Plant manager N. E. Lewis of S&W Chemical, which makes phosgene near La Porte, told C&EN that no leaks oc­curred in the plant. At the time of the incident, Mr. Lewis says, he and other employees made a special leak check and found nothing. Phosgene can easily be detected in small quan­tities, Mr. Lewis points out, and would have been noticed in the plant had it been leaking. Mr. Lewis believes that the symptoms of the victims were not those of phosgene poisoning.

A Du Pont plant north of La Porte uses phosgene produced by S&W. Plant manager T. T. Chase says they, too, checked their operations as soon as they heard of the incident and found no possibility that any fumes came from the plant. If the wind were from the southwest, the location of the Du Pont plant precludes any gases' moving to La Porte.