Uhde GmbH (Dortmund, Germany; www.uhde.biz) has commercialized a new gasifier design, the Prenflo (pressurized entrained-flow) with Direct Quench (PDQ) process, which is an optimized design of its Prenflo PSG gasification process for applications requiring hydrogen-rich syngas generation (ammonia, methanol, H2,…
PHREG Technologies, Inc., a startup company in Yorba Linda, Calif., has received a patent on a pyrolysis process that converts municipal waste and other bio-organic materials into a synthetic gas of 350–600 Btu/scf quality, depending on the nature of the…
Decoking in a delayed coker operation is a laborious process that can take up to 18 h. A new method that reduces the time to 6 h has been developed by US Cokertech, LLC (Norman, Okla.). This effectively triples capacity…
Tantaline (Lyngby, Demnark; www.tantaline.com) has developed a process that creates a surface alloy of tantalum on a metal substrate (typically stainless steel). As a result, the surface acquires the corrosion resistance of tantalum — the most corrosion resistant metal commercially available…
Plant Watch Oxea expands carboxylic-acids production, adds butyric acid October 14, 2008 — Oxea GmbH has decided to produce butyric acid at its North American production site in Bay City, Tex. The existing carboxylic-acids production plant will receive significant upgrading.…
Heavy crude UOP LLC (Des Plaines, Ill.; www.uop.com) plans to do further development of its Catalytic Crude Upgrading (CCU) technology through an agreement with Brazil’s Petrobras (Rio de Janeiro) and Albemarle Corp. (Baton Rouge, La.). CCU is a process…
GEA Procomac, a company of GEA Group AG (Bochum, Germany; www.geagroup.com) specialized in aseptic filling technology for PET containers, has received an order for a low acid aseptic filling line from Nestlé USA to be delivered in 2009. The order…
Evonik Industries AG (Essen, Germany; www.evonik.com) plans to build a new facility for producing hydrogen peroxide, which is used primarily in the production of cellulose and paper, at the Triunfo petrochemical complex near Porto Alegre, in southern Brazil. An investment…
UOP LLC (Des Plaines, Ill.; www.uop.com), a Honeywell company, announced that it was awarded a $1.5-million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to develop economically viable technology to stabilize pyrolysis oil from second-generation biomass feedstocks for use as…
The Linde Group (Munich, Germany; www.linde.com), via its Swiss subsidiary PanGas AG (Dagmersellen, Switzerland; www.pangas.ch), is to build a new air separation plant in Muttenz, in the Swiss canton of Basel-Land, for around 68 million Swiss francs (44 million euros).…