Solvay Solexis (Bollate, Italy; www.solvaysolexis.com) announces today its plan for the production of a substitute of PFOA (Perfluorooctanoate ammonium). PFOA is a chemical used up to now by Solvay Solexis and other companies as surfactant in the production process of…
Dow Corning Corp. (Midland, Mich.; www.dowcorning.com) has acquired two chemical-grade-silicon manufacturing assets from Globe Specialty Metals, in an acquisition valued at approximately $175 million. Dow Corning purchased 100% of Globe Metais Indústria e Comércio S.A., a silicon metal manufacturer in…
China owns the world’s third largest coal reserves, and naturally looks into ways of valuing them in order to reduce its growing dependency on foreign energy sources and feedstock. Several technologies based on coal gasification allow the transformation of coal…
DSM Pharmaceutical Products (Parsippany, N.J.; www.dsmpharmaceuticals.com) has announced a manufacturing alliance with Galenix (Saint Jean D'Illac, France; www.galenix.fr), where DSM will be the preferred commercial-scale-manufacturing partner for Galenix on a global basis. DSM and Galenix will collaborate on business development…
Univation Technologies LLC (Houston; www.univation.com) announced that Yulin Energy and Chemical Ltd. of Yanchang Petroleum Group Co. (Yulin) has selected Univation’s Unipol PE Process for a 300,000 metric ton (m.t.) per year polyethylene (PE) plant. The facility will be located…
A new biomass-to-oil power plant in Europe will use a process developed by Envergent Technologies (Des Plaines, Ill.; www.envergenttech.com), a Honeywell (Morris Township, N.J.; www.honeywell.com) company. Plans for the facility, which is projected to begin operation in 2012, followed an…
Linde Gases (Munich, Germany; www.linde.com) today announced agreements with two large Thai petrochemical companies to supply high-purity gases for product development and process control. The first agreement, with the Thai state-owned PTT Group (Bangkok, Thailand; www.pttplc.com), is being touted as the…
BASF announces its intention to cease activities in Feluy, Belgium October 22, 2009 — BASF Antwerpen N.V., a wholly owned subsidiary of BASF SE (Ludwigshafen, Germany; http://www.basf.com) has announced its intention to close its 115,000-ton/yr maleic anhydride (MA) production facility…
The call for papers process for the 2010 AIChE Spring Meeting (San Antonio, Tex., March 21–25, 2010) is now open. Professionals working in all areas of chemical engineering and related disciplines are invited to submit proposals. Submissions in the following…
Biomass and Alternate Fuel Systems: An Engineering and Economic Guide. Edited by Thomas F. McGowan. John Wiley and Sons Inc. 111 River St., Hoboken, NJ 07030. Web: http://www.wiley.com. 2009. 264 pages. $89.95 Reviewed by Thomas B. Reed, The Biomass Energy…