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Current economic trends

Capital equipment prices, as reflected in the CE Plant Cost Index (CEPCI), decreased approximately 0.10%  on average from April to May, after increasing approximately 1.14% from March to April. Meanwhile, according to the American Chemistry Council’s (Washington, D.C.; www.americanchemistry.com) mid-year…

Evaluating Capital Cost Estimation Programs

Capital cost assessment is an integral part of process design when building or expanding a chemical process plant. It is required to provide project analysis and evaluation, to select among alternative designs, to plan the appropriation of funds and to…

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BASF to optimize and consolidate its PAM-bead production  

BASF SE (Ludwigshafen, Germany; www.basf.com) will consolidate the production of polyacrylamide (PAM) beads into its Bradford, U.K. facility, where the company operates a backward-integrated production plant with worldwide supply capability. Significant investment will be made to increase and upgrade the…

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Linde to build two large ASUs in China  

The technology company The Linde Group (Munich, Germany; www.linde.com) has been commissioned to build and operate two large air-separation units (ASUs) to supply gases on site to the Chinese company Yantai Wanhua in Shandong (East China). The contract for the…

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Siemens to supply eight coal gasifiers to China  

Siemens Energy (Erlangen, Germany; www.siemens.de/energy) has received an order from China to deliver eight coal gasifiers. The units, with a thermal rating of 500 megawatts each, are for a coal gasification plant in Yili City in Xinjiang province. The plant…

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Synthetic fuels: Distributed production set to take off  

Following successful the successful demonstration of its microchannel Fischer-Tropsch (F-T) reactor for small-scale production of biofuels at a biomass gasification plant in Güssing, Austria, the Oxford Catalysts Group Plc. (Abingdon, U.K.; www.oxfordcatalysts.com) has now received an order for two full-scale…

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KBR’s phenol technology for Lihuayi Weiyuan Chemical  

KBR (Houston; www.kbr.com) was awarded a contract by Lihuayi Weiyuan Chemical Co. to license its phenol technology for Lihuayi’s grassroots, 220,000-ton/yr phenol/acetone plant in Lijin County, Shandong Province, China. “The phenol/acetone project is one of the major organic chemical projects…

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Codexis and Chemtex: Detergent alcohols collaboration  

Codexis, Inc. (Redwood City, Calif.; www.codexis.com) and Chemtex Italia S.r.l. (Tortona, Italy; www.chemtex.com) , a global technology and engineering company wholly-owned by Italy’s Gruppo Mossi & Ghisolfi (M&G Group), today announced a broad collaboration to develop and produce sustainable detergent…

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Lanxess steps up commitment to China through local investments  

Lanxess AG (Leverkusen, Germany; www.lanxess.com) is strengthening its commitment to serve the growing Chinese market with premium products by making a number of local investments totaling more than €40 million. “China remains one of the fastest growing markets in Asia…