Bartec GmbH (Bad Mergentheim, Germany; www.bartec.de) has acquired Technor Safe Ex AS (Stavanger, Norway), one of the key markets for European oil-and-gas production, Technor heads its domestic market in the sale of explosion-proof equipment and systems. Typical applications for the…
GEA Mechanical Equipment (www.geaquipment.com), a segment of GEA Group AG (Bochum, Germany; www.geagroup.com) has received two major orders for the delivery of fuel systems for a gas-turbine power plant in Morocco and of decanters for the municipal wastewater clarification plant…
Technip (Paris, France; www.technip.com) has been awarded two lump sum contracts by Valero Refining Co. and Diamond Shamrock Refining Co. (both part of the Valero group) for two hydrogen plants at their refineries in Memphis, Tenn. and McKee, Tex. The…
Westec Environmental Solutions, LLC (WES; Chicago, Ill.; www.wes-worldwide.com) has developed a gas-liquid absorption technology that can dramatically enhance mass transfer in gas-liquid absorption, extraction and scrubbing systems. The patented WES Absorber operates co-currently and creates a micro-froth matrix that intensifies…
Enerkem Inc. (Montreal, Can-ada; www.enerkem.com) has broken ground in Edmonton, Alberta, on what is said to be the world’s first industrial-scale plant to produce liquid fuel from municipal solid waste. When the plant starts up at the end of 2011,…
Plastic derived from corn, used mostly for bottles and cups, costs about 20% more than petroleum-based plastics, but has two desirable qualities: it comes from a renewable resource and is biodegradable. However, the use of the plastic — polylactic acid…
Graphene Laboratories Inc. (Reading, Mass.; www.graphenelab.com) and CVD Equipment Corp. (Ronkonkoma, N.Y.; www.cvdequipment.com) recently announced the commercial launch of single-layer graphene films, marketed as CVDGraphene, grown by a chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process. Using slightly modified CVD equipment that has…
Last month at the IFAT Entsorga trade fair (September 13–17; Munich, Germany), Süd-Chemie AG (Munich; www.sud-chemie.com) introduced a chemical-free process that increases the energy production of wastewater-purification and biogas plants by as much as 30% while significantly reducing the disposal…
Improved C5 use Some 106,000 ton/yr of so-called spent C5 fraction is generated at Mitsui Chemicals Inc.’s (Mitsui; Tokyo, Japan; www.mitsuichem.com) naphtha cracker at its Chiba Factory. Presently, the company is selling about half of the C5 fraction (50,000 ton/yr)…
As demand for rare-earth metals in a wide range of technology applications continues to increase, efforts to reestablish mining and production of rare-earth elements (REEs) is underway outside China, currently the dominant force in REE production. Future supplies of REEs…