In The News
Business News: Plant Watch for September 2018
Plant Watch Asahi Kasei to install alkaline-water electrolysis system for Toshiba Energy August 13, 2018 — Asahi Kasei Corp. (Tokyo, Japan; www.asahi-kasei.co.jp) received an order from Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions Corp. (Kanagawa, Japan; www.toshiba-energy.com) for a 10-MW single-unit alkaline-water-electrolysis…
A push to upgrade naphthas into petrochemicals
Last month, MOL Group (Budapest, Hungary: www.mol.hu) entered into a strategic partnership with Inovacat (Amersfoort, the Netherlands; www.inovacat.com) to further upscale and commercialize Inovacat’s Gasolfin gasoline-to-olefins technology, which converts low-valued gasoline and naphthas into high-value propylene, butylene and BTX (benzene,…
A Closer Look at Pressure Relief
Understanding how to size and select pressure-relief devices is key to ensuring the safety of your facility Pressure-relief and pressure-regulating devices serve the critical purpose of protecting facilities, people and equipment from potentially harmful, even catastrophic overpressure situations. For this…
Achema 2018 Review
Sustainability, digitalization and flexible production approaches emerged as major themes at the recent Achema 2018 event in Germany Attendees at June’s Achema (www.achema.de) 2018 trade show for the chemical process industries (CPI) received healthy doses of information on products, technologies…
Australian minerals shipped to South Korea
Battery metals producer Australian Mines (Perth, Western Australia; www.australianmines.com.au) is scheduled to export the largest sample of battery-grade cobalt and nickel sulfate ever recorded from Australian mined and processed ore. The company will send 40 kg of nickel sulfate and…
Vacuum-aided membrane distillation results in ultra-pure water
At Achema 2018 (June 11–15; Frankfurt am Main, Germany), EvCon GmbH (Pliening-Landsham, Germany; www.evcon-water.com) showcased its new UPWater treatment system, which employs a patented vacuum multi-effect membrane distillation (VMEMD) technology to obtain ultra-pure water using less energy than comparable water-treatment…
Fuel-cell solution lowers operating costs using nanostructured catalysts
The two main barriers to widespread use of fuel cells have been securing a reliable source of hydrogen that avoids CO2 emissions, and cost — they have traditionally depended on expensive platinum and palladium catalyst materials. GenCell Energy Ltd. (Petach…
Advanced water electrolysis launched
Last month, thyssenkrupp Industrial Solutions AG (Dortmund, Germany; www.thyssenkrupp-industrial-solutions.com) launched industrial-scale water electrolysis systems that make large-scale hydrogen production from renewable electricity economically attractive. The advanced water electrolyzer (diagram) features a well-proven cell design paired with an especially large (2.7…
The commercial launch of 3-D-printed membranes
Last month, Nano Sun, a water technology start-up founded by a scientist from Nanyang Technological University (NTU; Singapore; www.ntu.edu.sg) launched a 3-D-printing facility to manufacture a new type of water-treatment membrane. Unlike conventional membrane-manufacturing processes, which use acids to make…
Plant Watch: Business News for August 2018
Plant Watch BASF to expand global antioxidant production capacities July 10, 2018 — BASF SE (Ludwigshafen, Germany; www.basf.com) plans to increase the global production capacity for its antioxidant Irganox 1010 by 40% with production expansion projects at its sites in…