A new technology that uses plasma to kill bacteria and simultaneously oxidize organic material in water systems offers a non-chemical alternative to water treatment in several industry sectors, such as food and beverage, power generation, oil and gas and others.…
Daylight-driven photocatalysts have attracted much attention in the context of “green” technology for reducing pollutants. Although a number of active materials have been reported and their applications are rapidly increasing, many are discovered after enormous experimental efforts. Now, Isao Tanaka…
Ammonia is a crucial chemical feedstock for fertilizer production, as well as a potential energy carrier. However, the current, century-old method of synthesizing ammonia, the Haber–Bosch process, consumes a great deal of energy, operating at high pressures (several hundred atmospheres)…
An adsorption desalination and cooling (ADC) plant has been implemented at Solar Village near the Saudi Arabian capital of Riyadh, by King Abdulaziz City of Science and Technology (KACST; www.kacst.edu.sa). The project to build the plant resulted from a collaboration…
A new alkylation technology that uses ionic liquids as a catalyst has been licensed by Honeywell UOP (Des Plaines, Ill.; www.uop.com), and will be marketed under the tradename Isoalkyl. The technology — developed by Chevron U.S.A. Inc., a subsidiary of…
Millions of tons of cotton-polyester-blend material that would normally be discarded in landfills could be recycled using a newly patented method for removing dyes from textiles, separating cotton from fabric blends, and depolymerizing polyesters. The process, developed and demonstrated by…
Toshiba Corp. (www.toshiba.co.jp), Mizuho Information & Research Institute, Inc. (MHIR; both Tokyo, Japan; www.mizuho-ir.co.jp) and 11 other industrial and academic partners have been selected to carry out a five-year project, “Demonstration of Sustainable CCS Technology Project,” sponsored by Japan’s Ministry…
Last month, Weatherly Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of KBR Inc. (Houston; www.kbr.com) introduced its new dual-pressure nitric acid (DPNA) technology, which enables economically viable production of HNO3 in large scale [over 1,000 metric tons per day (m.t./d)], as part…
Converting natural gas to liquid hydrocarbons can theoretically be accomplished at high temperatures with the help of zeolite catalysts, but the reaction is hindered by two major factors. The conversion to products is thermodynamically limited, and coke formation on the…
Current commercial technologies for separating and purifying p-xylene — an important precursor for polyesters and plastics — from hydrocarbon mixtures involve phase-change techniques that require large amounts of thermal energy. Recently, a research team from Georgia Institute of Technology (Ga.…