In The News
Georg Fischer acquires Harvel Plastics
Georg Fischer AG (Shaffhausen, Switzerland; www.georgfischer.com) announced today that it has agreed to acquire Harvel Plastics Inc. (Easton, Pa.), the U.S. market leader for industrial plastic pipes. This is another step in the implementation of Georg Fischer’s strategy to further…
Outotec to acquire all interests in Energy Products of Idaho
Outotec Oyj (Espoo, Finland; www.outotec.com) strengthens its portfolio of energy and environmental technologies by acquiring all interests in Energy Products of Idaho Limited Partnership (EPI; Coeur d'Alene; www.energyproducts.com). EPI has pioneered in the area of biomass and difficult waste materials…
Commercialization is set for a new alkylation process
An improved sulfuric-acid alkylation process that reduces acid consumption by up to 50% from that of conventional processes will make its commercial debut in China. Developed by Lummus Technology, a CB&I company (The Woodlands, Tex.; www.cbi.com), the technology will be…
Detecting steam-trap leaks gets easier
Steam traps are designed to allow condensate, but not steam, to escape from a steam line. When they malfunction, however, numerous costly consequences can result including energy losses, insufficient heating to processes, maintenance issues and more. At its Global Users…
Recover oil from messy spills with this mesh
A novel mesh for oil-water separation with opposite wettability to traditional materials has been developed by a group of researchers from Beijing, China — the Beijing National Laboratory for Molecular Sciences, Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences (www.iccas.ac.cn); School…
An in-pipe turbine system generates energy from water effluent
Hydrofoil turbines mounted inside gravity-fed water-effluent conduits can generate significant electrical power without impeding flow, a demonstration project has shown. The in-pipe turbine systems offer chemical process industries (CPI) companies a way to extract emission-free energy from flowing wastewater discharge…
December Chementator Briefs
Bio bisabolene Through genetic engineering of microbes, scientists from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s (Berkeley, Calif.; www.lbl.gov) Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI) have coaxed both bacteria (Escherichia coli) and yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) to produce a chemical precursor to bisabolane — a critical…
Heat-exchanger ‘fusion’
Last month at the Brau Beviale 2011 Exhibition (November 9–11; Nuremberg, Germany), Alfa Laval AB (Lund, Sweden; www.alfalaval.com) launched a new plate heat exchanger, which combines the energy efficiency, accessibility and modularity of plate technology with the viscous and particulate-handling…
Making amides with high yield, less waste
A catalyst for making amides from alcohols and amines under aerobic conditions has been developed by Professor Shu Kobayashi and his research group at the University of Tokyo (Tokyo, www.chem.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp/users/synorg/index_e.html). The catalyst — nano particles (2.4-nm dia.) of gold and…
Optical cavity furnace can boost solar cell efficiency
Using an array of lamps inside a highly reflective chamber, the optical cavity furnace (OCF) takes advantage of photonics effects to help manufacture solar photovoltaic cells with higher efficiency than those made by conventional rapid-thermal-processing (RTP) methods. In addition, the…