In The News
Air Products supplying ASUs for copper-smelter project in Zambia
Air Products (Lehigh Valley, Pa.; www.airproducts.com) has been awarded the contract to supply two oxygen plants at the site of a copper smelter being built in Zambia by Kansanshi Mining Plc. The scope of the agreement includes Air Products supply…
BASF building its largest European production plant for emissions catalysts in Poland
BASF SE (Ludwigshafen, Germany; www.basf.com) is investing approximately €90 million in the first step to build a mobile emissions catalysts production facility in Åšroda ÅšlÄ…ska, a Special Economic Zone near WrocÅ‚aw, Poland. Construction of the new 40,000 square meter facility…
Uhde wins mega contract for fertilizer plants in the U.S.
ThyssenKrupp Uhde GmbH (Uhde; Dortmund, Germany; www.uhde.eu) has, through its U.S. business partner, Uhde Corporation of America (Pittsburgh, Pa.), been selected by CF Industries, one of the world's leading fertilizer producers, to provide engineering and supply services for two fertilizer…
Catalytic ethane-cracking process allows lower-temperature operation
Aither Chemicals LLC (South Charleston, W.Va.; www.aitherchemicals.com) is planning to build a commercial-scale plant based on a catalytic ethane-cracking process that uses 80% less energy and generates 60% less carbon dioxide than conventional steam-cracking of ethane. The company has refined…
Wanted: CPI Engineers
A number of factors, including plans for new plants and expansions, as well as the retirements of experienced personnel, are creating an especially competitive labor market for engineers and technical workers in the chemical process industries (CPI). The situation is…
Novasep to build the world’s largest chromatography plant for APIs and more news
Plant Watch Novasep to build world’s largest chromatography plant for APIs October 10, 2012 — Novasep (Pompey, France; www.novasep.com) has announced an investment of €30 million to build what will be the world’s largest chromatography plant for the production of…
This filtration system saves space, time and money
In the production of deionized (DI) water from river water, sand filters are commonly used to remove solid particles prior to the ion-exchange units. However, sand beds occupy a large space — as large as 3-m wide and over 5-m…
Two technologies combined to treat oil and gas wastewater
A partnership between New Sky Energy (Boulder, Colo.; www.newskyenergy.com) and 212 Resources (Houston, Tex.; www.212resources.com) combines the two companies’ technologies to generate freshwater and usable inorganic chemicals from produced water in petroleum and natural-gas drilling operations. 212 Resources…
A new catalyst enables lower-temperature H2 production using the sulfur-iodine cycle
Among the many different ways being investigated for making hydrogen “from water” is the so-called sulfur-iodine (S-I) cycle, which involves three chemical reactions whose net products are H2 and O2: the decomposition of sulfuric acid into SO2, H2O and O2;…
Quick-charging lithium ion batteries on the horizon
Conventional lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) are unsuitable for high power applications as in electric vehicles, because they take a long time to charge, according to a team from the Interdisciplinary School of Green Energy, of the Ulsan National Institute of Science…