In The News
A Bright Future for Quantum Dots
The novel performance characteristics and tunability of quantum dots make them a promising nanomaterial in numerous emerging applications Quantum dots (QDs) represent a broad group of semiconducting nanoparticles that feature a unique combination of optical and electronic properties. For example,…
Distillation Column Internals: It’s What’s on the Inside that Counts
New column internals boost efficiency and improve reliability of distillation towers In the chemical process industries (CPI), the majority of separations are done via distillation columns. And, when the rest of the process relies upon those columns, inefficiencies, bottlenecks and…
Business News – April 2019
Plant Watch Asahi Kasei plans LIB separator capacity expansions March 14, 2019 — Asahi Kasei Corp. (Tokyo, Japan; www.asahi-kasei.co.jp) will enhance its manufacturing infrastructure for lithium-ion battery (LIB) separator products at the company’s existing facilities in Moriyama, Japan and North…
Chementator Briefs
‘Green’ steelmaking Seamlessly following the successful completion of the GrInHy project (Green Industrial Hydrogen via reversible high-temperature electrolysis) in February, the GrInHy2.0 project was launched last month at the Salzgitter Flachstahl GmbH steelworks (Germany; www.salzgitter-flachstahl.de). Together with partners Sunfire GmbH…
This P-recovery process is market-ready
At PowTech 2019 this month (Nuremberg, Germany), Glatt Ingenieurtechnik GmbH (Weimar, Germany; www.glatt.com) introduced a waste-free process that recycles the phosphorus from sewage-sludge ash to produce ready-to-use, high-quality fertilizers. The market-ready process fulfills the legal obligation of the German fertilizer…
Mechanochemistry performs cross-coupling reactions
Palladium-catalyzed cross-coupling reactions are one of the most powerful and versatile methods to synthesize a wide range of complex functionalized molecules. However, the development of solid-state cross-coupling reactions remains extremely limited. Now, Hajime Itoh, Koji Kubota and colleagues at Hokkaido…
New membranes resist biofouling using sunlight
Membranes in large-scale water-treatment processes are often fouled by accumulation of bacteria or their biofilms. Now, a team of researchers from Washington University St. Louis (WUSTL; St. Louis, Mo.; www.wustl.edu) have combined graphene oxide and bacterial nanocellulose to design a…
Chemical Recycling Makes Waste Plastic a Resource
With an eye toward a circular economy, technology developers are advancing a host of new approaches to chemical recycling of post-use commodity plastics Plastics are indispensable parts of almost every sector of the economy, with wide-ranging economic, environmental and convenience…
A new, more comprehensive electronegativity scale
The electronegativity of atoms is one of the most well-known parameters for explaining why chemical reactions occur. Now, Martin Rahm, assistant professor of physical chemistry at Chalmers University of Technology (Gothenburg, Sweden; www.chalmers.se), has redefined the concept with a new,…
Flow Monitoring for Today’s Chemical Processes
New technologies provide diagnostics and calibration verification to improve maintenance and process efficiency Because many processes in the chemical process industries (CPI)are controlled by flow, it is important that the technology selected for flow monitoring and measurement is not only…