Tantalum and niobium, which are often found in complex ores, are essentially chemically inert metals whose recovery involves some harsh measures: typically dissolution of the metals concentrate in a mixture of concentrated hydrofluoric and sulfuric acids, followed by solvent extraction…
North America Risk Management of Corrodible Systems. National Assn. of Corrosion Engineers (Houston). Phone: 281-228-6200; Web: event.nace.org Orlando, Fla. June 18–20 Valve World Americas Expo & Conference. Messe Düsseldorf North America (Chicago, Ill.). Phone: 312-781-5185; Web: mdna.com Houston June 25–26…
An improved H2SO4 process developed by CB&I (The Woodlands, Tex.; www.cbi.com) has now been licensed to three companies, all in China. The first licensee was Ningbo Haiyue New Material Co. Ltd., which is building a 600,000-m.t./yr plant near Ningbo City,…
Industrial uses of high-intensity ultrasound have grown tremendously over the past 25 years, says Kenneth Suslick, professor of chemistry at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and one of the pioneers in the field. Ultrasonic welding of plastics is universal,…
China’s largest private chemical EPC (engineering, procurement, construction) contractor, Wison Engineering Ltd. (Wison; Shanghai; www.wison.com) has recently introduced details about its proprietary butadiene technology, which is set for commercialization. The process aims to meet the anticipated growth in annual butadiene…
Oji Holdings Corp. (OJI; www.ojiholdings.co.jp) and Mitsubishi Chemical Corp. (MCC; both Tokyo, Japan; www.m-kagaku.co.jp) have developed a continuous process for producing transparent sheets made from ultra-thin, wood-based cellulose nanofibers (CNF). Both OJI’s papermaking technology and MCC’s chemical treatment technology contributed…
MP Series piston manifolds are Class 800 forged manifolds available with four, eight or twelve stations. Each connection point has a built-in piston valve, minimizing the amount of space required for installation. MP Series manifolds contain a high-performance, Class 800…
Have you ever participated in a team-building exercise, the type where Human Resources personnel teach a group of individuals how to work better together? I’ll bet that during my career I participated in about ten such exercises, but right now…
Process sensors and actuators provide a wealth of information about their status. The Namur recommendation NE 107 that proposes standardized, easily understandable status indicators was issued by the International User Association for Automation in Process Industries (Namur; Leverkusen, Germany; www.namur.de),…
With the advent of smart or intelligent field devices, a wealth of digital information has become available. However, what does the host system do with these data? The field device transmits a bucket of bits to the host system. How…