Hou Xianglin: I am refining oil for the motherland

Hou Xianglin is one of the pioneers of my country's petrochemical technology and the founder of oil refining technology. He is called a "strategic scientist". He has been associated with oil all his life, worried about oil, happy to hear oil, and devoted himself to the petrochemical industry of our country.
 

　　Secretly join the party and study in the United States
In April 1912, Hou Xianglin was born in Shantou Evangelical Hospital. He was the eighth child of Reverend Hou Yichu. In the chemistry class of the affiliated Senior high school of St. John's University in Shanghai, Hou Xianglin heard the teacher say that there is great energy in the nucleus, and if it can be released, it will be very powerful. He was very excited. From then on, he became fascinated with chemistry and took chemical research as a lifelong career.
In September 1931, Hou Xianglin was admitted to the Department of Chemistry of Yanjing University. During this period, he took Zhang Dongsun's philosophy, Lei Jieqiong's sociology, economics, political science, German, French, British literature history and other courses. The students of Yanjing University are active in thinking and actively participate in various activities of resisting Japan and saving the nation. Many Yanjing University students have joined the Communist Party of China in search of a life path to save the nation. In the summer of 1935, after graduating from Yanjing University, Hou Xianglin was admitted as a graduate student at the Institute of Chemistry of Academia Sinica in Shanghai. In the winter of 1938, he left Shanghai and went to Changsha. He participated in the Anti-Japanese Support Association of the cultural circles, and had activities with Lu Zhenyu, Jian Bozan, Yu Shudan, Du Huiyi, Li Renlian, etc. Everyone actively asked to join the Communist Party of China. In this year, in a small room in Changsha, facing the portrait of Lenin, Hou Xianglin solemnly swore to join the Communist Party of China.
Hou Xianglin also longed to go to Yan'an and tried to go to the forefront of the Anti-Japanese War, but failed to do so due to various factors. At that time, there was a serious shortage of oil in the front line of the Anti Japanese War. As a young scientific and technological worker, he had been engaged in the work related to oil refining and chemical industry in the rear area, and secretly did the party's work.
Hou Xianglin studied at the postgraduate level at the Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University) in Pittsburgh, USA. After obtaining a doctorate in chemical engineering, he went to the Fuel Research Office of the Department of Chemistry of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as an associate researcher for a period of time. One-year vortex bed coal gasification research. In addition to studying and doing papers most of the time, Hou Xianglin also used the weekend to do two things: one is to expand the influence of the "North American Christian Chinese Student Union"; the other is to establish the "Association of Chinese Scientists in the United States", referred to as the "Association for Science and Technology in the United States". At the end of 1949, Zhu Guangya, chairman of the Midwest Association of the "North American Christian Chinese Student Union", organized the drafting of an open letter to students studying in the United States, calling on Chinese students to return to China. In March 1950, during his stay in Hong Kong, Hua Luogeng published the "Open Letter to the People Studying in the United States", which was broadcast to the world through Xinhua News Agency. The letter quoted "Although Liangyuan is good, it is not a long-lived hometown, and it is coming back." It is very contagious and widely recited among overseas students.

　
　Join the NLD and go to Dalian 
In May 1950, Hou Xianglin returned to Beijing on a Norwegian freighter. After the party organization relationship was transferred back from Hong Kong, Hou Xianglin reported to the Organization Department of the CPC Central Committee. After the arrangement of the party organization, his working relationship was in the General Administration of Petroleum Administration of the Ministry of Fuel Industry, and he was also a professor of the Department of Chemical Engineering of Tsinghua University. Jin Yuelin, a professor of philosophy, shared a bungalow.
Hou Xianglin's entry introducers were Hua Luogeng and Sun Yutang. Hua Luogeng, who was also working at Tsinghua University at that time, thought Hou Xianglin's quality was "very good", saying that he could reach out to the masses and had a good reputation. He was "very active in the work of the Association for Science and Technology in the United States" and indicated that the Association for Science and Technology was a progressive group. Sun Yu-tang, another introducer to the alliance, is a historian. He believes that Hou Xianglin is a well-educated scientist who is serious, serious, active, enthusiastic and helpful to people and things. Soon, according to the national strategic layout and chemical professional needs, Hou Xianglin went to Dalian to work.
In 1952, when the departments of Tsinghua University were adjusted, the General Administration of Petroleum Administration negotiated with Tsinghua University and decided to suspend the fuel research laboratory and transfer full-time scientific researchers to the Institute of Industrial Chemistry of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (later known as Dalian Institute of Chemistry). Hou Xianglin was also transferred to Dalian as a representative of the General Administration of Petroleum Administration and acting director of the Senior Gasoline Research Office. The predecessor of the institute was the "Manchurian Railway Central Experimental Institute" left by the Japanese, and it was the best oil refining research institute in East Asia at that time. The earliest group of scientists in the institute, Zhang Dayu, Guo Hefu, Xiao Guangyan, Zhang Cunhao, Liu Jingyi, Tao Yusheng, etc., all broke through many obstacles and resolutely returned to China and devoted themselves to the construction of New China. In Hou Xianglin's eyes, the Dalian Institute of Chemical Technology is full of talents, and the General Administration of Petroleum has reserved scientific and technological talents there to train and exercise in scientific research work, laying the foundation for the Ministry of Fuel (Petroleum) Industry to establish its own scientific research institutions in the future. In the later refining practice, the colleagues of Dalian Institute of Chemical Technology have always been Hou Xianglin's close comrades and right-hand men.

　　Science and technology to serve the country, a worthy era
At the beginning of the Anti-Japanese War, due to the Japanese blockade, military supplies were extremely short of oil, and cars and planes were in urgent need of oil. In order to meet the urgent needs of the country, Hou Xianglin was appointed by the party organization to start the oil refining business of "one drop of blood and one drop of oil" in the rear. He refined diesel from vegetable oil, refined oil by low-temperature carbonization of coal, and blended alcohol with gasoline as fuel. After the founding of New China, there was no domestic oil, so we had to rely on imports. In 1959, due to the tense relations between China and the Soviet Union, the quantity of petroleum products imported from the Soviet Union, especially military supplies, decreased sharply, resulting in a nationwide "oil shortage". Many cars had to use gas as fuel, especially aviation kerosene, which was almost impossible to supply. Fighter planes could not take off at the airport, and national defense security was directly threatened. At that time, Hou Xianglin, who had already served as vice president of the Petrochemical Research Institute, was mainly responsible for refining technology. In order to develop the fuel needed for atomic bombs, missiles and supersonic aircraft, and to ensure the "two bombs and one satellite", the "Twelve-Year Plan for China's Oil Refining Industry" was formulated at the Xiangshan Conference held in 1962. The meeting proposed five modern refining technologies, namely fluid catalytic cracking, catalytic reforming, delayed coking, urea dewaxing and related catalysts and additives. Due to the blockade of external technology, China's research and development of oil refining technology can only rely on their own groping. This arduous task was accomplished under the direct leadership of Hou Xianglin. These five technologies made my country's oil refining technology quickly approach the world's advanced level at that time, and are still widely used in all aspects of scientific research and national defense construction, ensuring the autonomy of my country's oil refining technology research and development capabilities.
In the latter half of his life, Hou Xianglin was closely connected with the country's emerging petrochemical industry. He also personally participated in the discussion and investigation of some major national issues. In the spring of 1992, six members of the academic department, including Zhang Guangdou, Wang Daheng, Shi Changxu, Zhang Wei, Hou Xianglin, and Luo Peilin, once again jointly put forward the proposal of "establishing the Chinese Academy of Engineering and Technology at an early date." coupled with the appeal in the CPPCC proposal for many years, this proposal was finally adopted by the State Council. In addition, Hou Xianglin also actively promoted the convening of the World Petroleum Congress in China, the completion of the new China Science and Technology Museum, and increased investment in the renewal of scientific research equipment.
"The old man is determined for thousands of miles," Hou Xianglin did not stop when he should have been enjoying his life. At the invitation of Comrade Wen Jiabao, 91-year-old Hou Xianglin was responsible for launching the "Strategic Research on China's Sustainable Development of Oil and Gas Resources" and led 31 academicians and 120 experts to jointly carry out the research. At the age of 92, Hou Xianglin reported to the premier that his wife died that night. 93 years old, the Great Hall of the people held a "report on Hou Xianglin's advanced deeds"; 95 years old, Hou Xianglin biographical documentary premiered in Beijing; December 2008, hou Xianglin died in Beijing at the age of 96.

Source: China Organization and Personnel News Network