A research team from the University of New South Wales (Sydney, Australia; www.unsw.edu.au) and Ruhr-Universität Bochum (Bochum, Germany; www.ruhr-universität-bochum.de) has succeeded in transferring structural characteristics of natural enzymes to metallic nanoparticles, achieving high catalytic activity. In the case of enzymes,…
Rare-earth elements (REEs), such as scandium, are in high demand, but it is often difficult to economically recover and extract them. Now, II-VI Inc. (Saxonburg, Pa.; www.ii-vi.com) has developed a patent-pending process utilizing selective ion recovery (SIR) that enables highly…
Renewable jet fuel At the end of last October, euglena Co. (Tokyo, Japan; www.euglena.jp) completed the construction of Japan’s first demonstration plant for the production of renewable jet and diesel fuel in Yokohama. The $58-million pilot plant, located at the…
Today, all commercial lithium is sourced from ores or brines on land, where the total lithium reserves amount to 14 million tons. In contrast, the oceans contain 230 billion tons of lithium, although the lithium concentration in seawater is very…
Current oil-water separation technologies, such as centrifugation, filtration, dissolved air flotation, distillation, oil skinners, adsorption and electrochemical methods, are of low efficiency and consume a lot of energy during complex separation processes. Mesh membranes have attracted much interest lately, and…
Plant Watch Synthomer opens expanded nitrile latex production facility in Malaysia November 13, 2018 — Synthomer (London, U.K.; www.synthomer.com) opened its expanded nitrile latex production facility in Pasir Gudang, Malaysia. This $63.5-million project added 90,000 metric tons per year (m.t./yr)…
In order for ammonia to serve as a hydrogen carrier, it is necessary to develop separation techniques that can reliably recover H2 from the decomposition of NH3 with sufficient purity for operating proton-exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells. A step in…
Aerogels — ultralight, insulating and heat-resistant nanoporous solids — offer benefits in many applications, but commercially available aerogels are typically limited to just two formats: particles and blankets. Aerogel Technologies, LLC (Boston, Mass.; www.aerogeltechnologies.com) is currently constructing a pilot plant…
A collaboration between JGC Corp. (JGC, Yokohama, Japan; www.jgc.com), the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), the National Institute of Technology, Numazu College, and JGC’s subsidiary, JGC Catalysts & Chemicals Ltd., (JGC Group), under the auspices of…
A new production process for engineering a range of nano- and microstructured solid materials can reduce the costs of manufacturing the materials compared to conventional “wet-chemistry” approaches, and can allow novel chemistries that are not accessible through traditional methods. Developer…