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Division

Records created by the Warren Spring Laboratory and successors

Catalogue reference: Division within AY

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Division within AY

Records of the Warren Spring Laboratory, established as a non-specific research institution in 1958, include the registered files of the Laboratory in AY 28 and AY 40 Annual reports of the Laboratory, and business and corporate plans, are in AY...

Full description and record details

Reference
Division within AY
Title
Records created by the Warren Spring Laboratory and successors
Date
1957-1992
Description

Records of the Warren Spring Laboratory, established as a non-specific research institution in 1958, include the registered files of the Laboratory in AY 28 and AY 40

Annual reports of the Laboratory, and business and corporate plans, are in AY 24

Publicity material is in AY 38

Related material

Earlier papers of the Extraction of Metals Group: DSIR 50

Legal status
Public Record(s)
Language
English
Creator(s)
  • Department of Industry, Warren Spring Laboratory, 1974-1983
  • Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, Warren Spring Laboratory, 1958-1965
  • Department of Trade and Industry, Warren Spring Laboratory, 1970-1974
  • Department of Trade and Industry, Warren Spring Laboratory, 1983-1994
  • Ministry of Technology, Warren Spring Laboratory, 1965-1970
Physical description
3 series
Immediate source of acquisition

From 1983 Department of Trade and Industry

Subjects
Topics
Research
Custodial history
Records transferred to the Public Record Office from the Department of Industry from 1981 to 1983.
Administrative / biographical background

The Warren Spring Laboratory was established under the control of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research at Stevenage in 1958. It took over some of the work of the former Fuel Research Station with respect to the synthesis of oil from carbon monoxide and hydrogen and research into atmospheric pollution. It also took over the Fuel Research Station's Scottish branch at Thorntonhall.

The laboratory was initially envisaged entirely as a replacement for the earlier establishment, but the Research Council of the department decided to discontinue substantial parts of that station's programme and to accelerate the building of the new one for purposes much wider than fuel research, in particular for process research and development over a wide field. For this reason its name was derived from local topography and did not imply limitation to a specific field.

It took over from the department's Headquarters Office the research programme in the field of human sciences. Another important sphere of its activities was to be chemical engineering research, and in this connection it absorbed the Chemical Engineering Group of the National Chemical Laboratory in January 1959. In May 1964 that laboratory's Extraction of Metals Group was taken over and integrated with the Mineral Processing Division.

The Warren Spring Laboratory was transferred to the Ministry of Technology in 1965, the Department of Trade and Industry in 1970, the Department of Industry in 1974, and the second Department of Trade and Industry in 1983.

In 1978 the MAPCON Unit was set up within the Control Engineering Division (subsequently the Control Engineering/Computer Services Division). This administered a scheme designed to encourage the use of microelectronics by manufacturing industry.

The laboratory's later research covered the bulk handling of powders, pastes and slurries; process control and on-line analytical systems; catalysis; mineral concentration; pyro and hydro-metallurgy; air pollution; oil pollution; and recovery of materials from domestic and industrial wastes.

On 1 April 1994, the Warren Spring Laboratory merged with AEA Technology to form the National Environmental Technology Centre (NETCEN).

Record URL
https://beta.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue/id/C1075/

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Records created by the Warren Spring Laboratory and successors

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