W.L. Badger Associates Collection

W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated was an American chemical engineering consulting firm noted for its expertise with evaporators and water desalination. It was founded by Walter L. Badger (1886-1958), a prominent American chemical engineer and a noted expert on evaporators. The firm’s origins date back to 1917 when Badger, then a chemical engineering professor at the University of Michigan, was offered a consultant position by Swenson Evaporator Company and asked to design a research laboratory for them. Believing that such a project was best carried out by a university, Badger negotiated a joint venture between Swenson and the University of Michigan, in which Swenson built a new chemical engineering laboratory at the University of Michigan campus and was in return permitted to use it for its own purposes.

From 1917 to 1937, Badger ran the new laboratory for the two cooperating parties, serving as both Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Michigan (where he supervised graduate student and future CHF patron Donald L. Othmer) and as Consulting Engineer at Swenson. In this dual capacity, Badger worked with a number of Swenson’s clients, assisting them with the planning, operation, and troubleshooting of their evaporators. The partnership between Swenson and the University of Michigan proved very successful. As a result, Badger’s chemical engineering consultant practice grew considerably.

In 1937, Badger resigned his professorship at the University of Michigan and was named Manager of Dow Chemical Company’s Consulting Engineering Division. At Dow, he played a key role in the company’s development of vaporizers and heating equipment using Dowtherm heat transfer fluid. He was also responsible for the revision of the caustic finishing plant at Dow’s Great Western Electrochemical Plant in Pittsburg, California and performed consultant work for a number of Dow’s clients. In addition to working full-time at Dow, Badger continued to do private consulting work on the side, maintaining a close relationship with Swenson Evaporator Company and the University of Michigan.

Dow disbanded its Consulting Engineering Division in 1944, which prompted Badger to go into business for himself. That same year, he established W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer, an independent chemical engineering consultant practice based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Largely picking up from where Dow left off, the new practice soon became noted for its expertise with evaporators. The firm grew and acquired a large and international clientele. Between the mid 1940s and mid 1950s, it focused mainly on evaporators designed to recover solids from solutions, which included those at salt plants operated by International Salt Company in the United States, and a salt, caustic soda, and chlorine plant operated by Murgatroyd’s Salt and Chemical Company in England. During the mid 1950s, W.L. Badger also started working on evaporators designed to recover water, which most notably involved early research and development work on water desalination plants for the U.S Department of the Interior’s Office of Saline Water. In order to expand and keep up with its growing clientele, the firm was incorporated in the State of Michigan and renamed W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated in 1957, with Walter L. Badger serving as president.

Walter L. Badger passed away suddenly on November 19, 1958. He was succeeded as president by Ferris C. Standiford, Badger’s very first employee and a prominent chemical engineer in his own right. Under Standiford’s leadership, W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated continued to flourish. Between 1958 and 1977, the firm was renowned for its work on evaporators for water desalination plants in the United States and abroad. Of particular note was the firm’s engineering and development work on two water desalination plants built and operated by the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Office of Saline Water: the Freeport, Texas Demonstration Plant and the Harbor Island, North Carolina Pilot Plant. During this time period, W.L. Badger was also a co-owner of Seawater Conversion Corporation, a joint venture with Kaighin and Hughes, Incorporated established to design, build, and operate water desalination facilities using Long-Tube-Vertical Multiple-Effect evaporator systems. The firm also continued to work on evaporators for the recovery of solids from solutions, which included those for salt plants operated by Morton Salt Company in the United States and Refinaria Sal ITA S.A. in Brazil.

W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated relocated to Greenbank, Washington in 1977. From about that point on, the firm became less active and gradually wound down its activities over a period of many years. However the firm continued to do notable work. Under its auspices during the late 1970s and early 1980s, Ferris C. Standiford worked on the development of falling film multistage flash evaporators. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, the firm was a co-owner of Spintech Industries, Incorporated, a Bellevue, Washington based firm that manufactured the Spinflash 5000, a small water desalination machine.

W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated held its last board of directors meeting on March 1, 2002. Ferris C. Standiford passed away on June 10, 2003.

Sources

W.L. Badger Associates Collection, Chemical Heritage Foundation Archives, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.