Edgar Stanley Freed

Edgar Stanley Freed (August 8, 1889 – November 2, 1950) was an American chemical engineer whose pioneering work in Chile transformed the nitrate and non-metallic mining industries during the first half of the twentieth century. He is best known for developing large-scale solar evaporation ponds, a technology that enabled the recovery of valuable minerals from low-grade caliche deposits in the Atacama Desert. His innovations—including the self-sealing mixture known as Freed Cement and the Solar Evaporation System—remain central to the production of iodine and specialty fertilizers in northern Chile.