Shell Development Company

The Emeryville Research Center of Shell Development Company in Emeryville, California was a major research facility of Shell Oil Company in the United States from 1928 until 1972, when Shell Development relocated to Houston, Texas. Shell Development's Emeryville facilities were located on about 27 acres (110,000 m²), included nearly 90 buildings at its peak, and when decommissioned in 1972, employed a staff of about 1500.

Tricresyl phosphate (TCP) and other gasoline additives were developed at Emeryville. Tar sands extraction and other techniques to increase oil reserves were studied at bench scale and in pilot plants. Shell Development also pioneered de-sulfurization methods and standards for gasoline and motor oil, which were significant in reducing acid rain and other adverse environmental effects of auto exhaust gases. Shell Development scientist Thomas Schatzky also pioneered fingerprinting techniques to identify oil spills' origins.

Shell Development Emeryville scientists created the epoxy resins and expanded their applications. In an early dramatization of the new material, Shell Development's team recorded and pressed a musical performance on epoxy resin rather than on vinyl. A classical harpsichordist who was the wife of a scientist performed. Epoxy / carbon fiber and other advanced composites were also pioneered there.

Shell polymer scientists revised the scientific community's understanding of polymerization physics for styrene-butadiene rubber (SBR), a principal component of most tires since World War II. After natural rubber from rubber trees was made unavailable by the Japanese conquest of Southeast Asia, SBR provided a new material for tires for the Allies' military vehicles. Shell's Charles Wilcoxen later demonstrated the kinetics of the polymerization process, amending the assumptions of the Ziegler-Natta polymerization equations for which a Nobel prize was awarded in 1963. Shell Development also pioneered a class of materials called block copolymers, useful for medical applications such as artificial heart valves.

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