Ernest Solvay

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Ernest Solvay (around 1900)

Ernest Gaston Joseph Solvay (* 16th April 1838 in Rebecq-Rognon , Belgium ; † 26. May 1922 in Ixelles , Brussels ) was a Belgian chemist and amateur researchers and developed as entrepreneurs to philanthropists . Together with his brother Alfred Solvay, he founded the Solvay Group. As a patron, Ernest Solvay wanted to “give back part of his wealth to mankind”. He founded several educational institutes and supported charitable institutions.

Life

Ernest Solvay was born as the second of five children of Alexandre Solvay and Adèle Hulin in Rebecq, Belgium, about 30 km from Brussels. His father owned a quarry , then founded an oil and soap business and later a salt factory.

Ernest wrote about it: “My father bought rock salt , dissolved it in water and then obtained table salt through evaporation . A well-known, easy-to-follow process. That's how I discovered soda in my childhood . "

Ernest Solvay had to leave school at the age of 16 due to pleurisy . He completed an apprenticeship in a gas works and made his first chemical experiments there. His state of health also prevented him from going to university, which is why he joined his uncle's cement factory at the age of 21 .

At the age of 23 he registered his first patent for the extraction of soda , which is used as a raw material for glass, dyes, soap and artificial fertilizers.

On September 18, 1863, he married Adèle Winderickx. He had four children with her.

In 1863 he founded his first own factory with his brother Alfred Solvay, who was two years his junior, and by 1865 he developed the Solvay process (also known as the ammonia-soda process), which he patented in 1872. Alongside the mining of natural soda, it is still the most frequently used chemical process to extract soda.

Solvay used the high income from his patent to fund many science and charity activities.

In contrast to his brother Alfred, Ernest had an open ear for social issues in addition to entrepreneurship .

In 1897 he contributed 25,000 francs to equipping the first Belgian polar expedition under Adrien de Gerlache de Gomery . As a thank you, he named a discovered mountain in the Palmer Archipelago , "Mount Solvay", after his patron.

Between 1893 and 1912 he founded the institutes for physiology , sociology , physics and chemistry at the Free University of Brussels . In addition, there was the Solvay Business School in 1903 and the International Institute for Physics and Chemistry in 1912.

In Brussels he convened congresses for physicists to discuss the fundamental problems of contemporary physics. The first Solvay conference took place in 1911.

During the First World War , Solvay and other industrialists and bankers from Belgium founded the “National Aid Committee”. It made large funds available to provide the needy population with basic food , clothing and coal. Despy-Meyer writes: “This national aid committee, for which he was fully committed, makes Ernest Solvay a mythical figure. When King Albert returned to Brussels from the front in November 1918, he immediately paid a visit to Ernest Solvay in his palace on the Rue des Champs-Élysées. A little later he appointed him Minister of State . "

Ernest Solvay was elected twice to the Belgian Senate and was appointed Minister of State at the age of 80.

He died at the age of 84.

Awards and honors

Solvay grave in Ixelles cemetery (Brussels)

The asteroid (7537) Solvay and the Solvayhütte were named after him. The Solvay Mountains on the Brabant Island in Antarctica also bear his name.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ GeneaStar: Ernest SOLVAY: Sa généalogie
  2. ↑ roglo.eu: Marthe Fitler
  3. ↑ roglo.eu: Ernest Solvay
  4. ↑ roglo.eu: Alfred Solvay
  5. ↑ Andreé Despy-Meyer , the archivist at the Free University of Brussels, writes in her biography : “Ernest Solvay was indeed an industrialist, but he was open to all social questions. Like a couple of other large industrialists of that time, he took care of the training of workers , introduced the eight-hour day , provided social benefits, founded schools, hospitals and leisure facilities. "
  6. ^ District W, intersection of Allee 15 with 16

Web links

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personal data
SURNAME Solvay, Ernest
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Solvay, Ernest Gaston Joseph (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Belgian chemist and amateur researcher
DATE OF BIRTH April 16, 1838
PLACE OF BIRTH Rebecq-Rognon , Belgium
DATE OF DEATH May 26, 1922
Place of death Ixelles , Brussels