In The News
BASF to invest in a world-scale acrylic acid complex in Brazil, and more business news
Plant Watch Ineos Technologies licenses its technology for a PP plant in China September 1, 2011 — Ineos Technologies (www.ineos.com) has licensed its Innovene PP (polypropylene) Process for the manufacture of homopolymers, random copolymers and impact copolymers to the Shaanxi…
A high-performance electrode material for lithium-ion batteries
A huge market for lithium ion batteries is expected to develop as car makers move toward electric vehicles. However, improvements in the batteries’ energy and power density are needed. It is also desirable to replace the common, high-cost lithium cobalt…
October Chementator Briefs
Renewable jet fuel Houston-based bioenergy company Terrabon Inc. (www.terrabon.com) has been awarded a $9.6-million, 18-month contract from Logos Technologies (Arlington, Va.; www.logos-technologies) to produce 6,000 L of renewable jet fuel for the Defense Advanced Research Products Agency (DARPA; Arlington,…
Making crude oil from coal, without mining or combustion
An underground coal-to-liquids (UCTL) technology is undergoing pilot testing at Oak Park, near Melbourne Australia, where a metric ton of brown coal is expected to yield about one barrel of oil suitable for use as refinery feedstock on an oil-parity…
A new approach to maintaining tubular heat exchangers
At the 2nd Annual ChemInnovations Conference and Expo (Houston; September 13–15), Hemi-O Technologies LLC (Corpus Christi, Tex.; dixonengineering@gmail.com) introduced its patent-pending technology that enables external access to individual tubes in a heat exchanger while the exchanger is in service and…
Dewatering enzymes boost ethanol production efficiency
A technique that improves the efficiency of ethanol plants by lowering the cost of dewatering the byproduct stillage (a slurry of corn solids and water) from the fermentation process has been developed by scientists at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s…
A new heterogeneous catalyst for low-temperature VOC decomposition
Professor Yuki Taniguchi at the Chemicals Research Institute, Tokyo Institute of Technology (Japan, www.res.titech.ac.jp/~gosei/taniguchi/index.html) has developed a new catalyst system that decomposes volatile organic compounds (VOCs) at lower temperatures than that required by conventional catalysts. The SILP (supported ionic liquid…
Evonik establishes JV in Russia to produce feed amino acid L-lysine
Evonik Industries AG (Essen, Germany; www.evonik.com) and Russian company RusBiotech International have established the joint venture (JV) Russkie Biotechnologii for manufacturing L-lysine in Russia by means of a biotechnological process. Vassily Golubev, governor of the Rostov-on-Don region, and Vadim Varshavsky,…
Caloric supplies H2 for polysilicon production in Taiwan
The hydrogen demand for a new polysilicon facility being built in Taiwan will be covered with units from Caloric Anlagenbau GmbH (Gräfelfing, Germany; www.caloric.com). With this contract Caloric establishes itself as a competent and reliable partner for this growing industry,…
MHI and MC: Large-scale SNG project using low-rank coal in Indonesia
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. (MHI; www.mhi.co.jp) and Mitsubishi Corp. (MC; both Tokyo, Japan; www.mitsubishicorp.com) have agreed with the Indonesian government to collaborate in a large-scale substitute natural gas (SNG) synthesis project utilizing Indonesia's abundant low rank coal (LRC) which is…