1930 - Granular Sulphate Plant, Warfield, BC
Posted by: 
T0SHEA
N 49° 06.201 W 117° 44.295
11U E 446114 N 5439207
This building is part of the Teck Fertilizer plant in Warfield.
Waymark Code: WMH5B1
Location: British Columbia, Canada
Date Posted: 05/25/2013
Views: 3
Though Consolidated Mining & Smelting was born in 1906, the original smelter on the site was built in 1895 by Frederick Augustus Heinze, one of the copper barons of Missoula, Montana.
This building would have been the first built on the site, as the plant was begun in 1930. The date was placed over one of the back doors of the building in order that it face the street. It is of cast concrete, cast into a header over the door and painted green.
The Cominco Copper-Lead-Zinc Smelter in Trail, BC had spewed sulphuric acid and other noxious things into the air of the Columbia River Valley for 34 years when, in 1929, the rest of the world said, in no uncertain terms, "ENOUGH!"
Cominco's reaction, admirably and wisely, was to find a purpose for otherwise waste byproducts, such as sulphuric acid, sulphur, phosphates, etc. As a result, construction of a fertilizer plant was commenced in 1930, and Cominco began to produce and market a range of "Elephant Brand" agricultural fertilizers. The plant, and this building, are still in operation to this day, a testament to the wisdom of this move.
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