In The News
Flame Retardants: Safety is the Key
Producers continue to improve the performance of their flame retardants while ensuring safe handling and environmental responsibility No matter where you are reading this article — in your home, on the train, in an airplane, at the library or office…
Dispersing sulfur into urea
A new technology demonstrated by Shell Sulphur Solutions (London; www.shell.com/sulphur) aims to incorporate micronized elemental sulfur (which provides nutrients to fertilized plants) into urea. The technology, UreaPluS, employs a patented emulsification technique that evenly distributes sulfur throughout the urea matrix,…
High-Performance Internals Boost Tower Capacities
New materials and designs help processors improve efficiency and reliability As in other areas of chemical manufacturing, processors want more efficiency from their distillation and mass-transfer operations. Increasing capacity, finding solutions to issues such as foaming and fouling that slow…
Conductive plastic for high-conductivity applications
Electrically conductive plastics have been available for several years, but the use of carbon black as the conductive agent in the plastic resins limits their use to low-conductivity applications. Now, newly commercialized plastic pellets impregnated with metal-coated carbon nanofibers allow…
An efficiency boost for solar hydrogen
The New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO, Kawasaki, Japan; www.nedo.go.jp) and the Japan Research Association of Artificial Photosynthetic Chemical Process (ARPChem) achieved a world-leading solar-energy conversion efficiency of 2% in the photocatalytic splitting of water to make H2…
May Chementator Briefs
A natural fungicide An international research team, led by Yoshikazu Ohya at the University of Tokyo (www.ib.k.u-tokyo.ac.jp), has discovered a new chemical compound that inhibits the growth of pathogenic fungi. The new compound, called poacic acid, was isolated from hydrolyzed…
Nanolaminated alloys grow parts for enhanced corrosion resistance
By controlling material interfaces at the nano-scale, Modumetal Inc. (Seattle, Wash.; www.modumetal.com) has developed a method for creating a new class of alloys with precisely defined properties through nanolamination. In this process, a part, such as a valve or fastener,…
‘Up-cycling’ perfluorinated polymers
At the end of March, Dyneon GmbH (Burgkirchen, Germany) — a fully owned subsidiary of 3M Co. (www.3m.com) — together with its cooperating partners, the Deutsche Bundesstiftung Umwelt, the University of Bayreuth and the institute InVerTec, opened the world’s first…
Making bioethanol directly from starch
Today, the cost of enzymes continues to make bioethanol uncompetitive as a fuel. Eliminating the need for amylases, which are used to hydrolyze starch into fermentable sugars, would be a key step toward reducing the operating costs for producing bioethanol.…
Air-capture of CO2 using waste process heat
Carbon-negative technology being commercialized by Global Thermostat LLC (New York, N.Y.; www.globalthermostat.com) removes carbon dioxide directly from the atmosphere using low-cost waste process heat from industrial processes. The technology works in a similar fashion to cogeneration approaches and could transform…