Latest News: Business
Neste Oil: Waste for renewable-diesel production
Neste Oil Corp. (Keilaranta, Finland; www. www.nesteoil.com) is to increase its use of waste as a raw material for producing NExBTL renewable diesel in 2011. Palm oil will continue to be the single largest raw material input, and is expected…
Global chemical industry production continues growth, ACC report says
Global chemical industry production continued to expand in January, according to the American Chemistry Council (ACC; Washington, D.C.; www.americanchemistry.com). In ACC’s latest Weekly Chemistry and Economic Trends report, the organization said world chemical production rose by 0.5% in January, a…
Solvay to double Solef PVDF production capacity
Solvay S.A. (Brussels, Belgium; www.solvay.com) has decided to increase its Solef production capacity by 50% to keep track of the continuously strong growing demand for this high added-value fluorinated specialty polymer. The capacity increase at Solvay's Tavaux plant, France, requires…
BASF: New plant for sodium methylate
BASF SE (Ludwigshafen, Germany; www.basf.com) intends to build an additional production plant for sodium methylate in South America. Argentina is the planned location for the second plant with an annual capacity of about 60,000 metric tons. Thus, BASF wants to…
Outotec: Effluent-treatment plant for Codelco
Outotec Oyj (Espoo, Finland; www.outotec.com) has signed a contract with the main copper producer in the world, Chilean Codelco for the design and delivery of an effluent treatment plant for Codelco's new Mina Ministro Hales project close to Calama, Chile.…
ThyssenKrupp: Smart energy-efficiency program has saved around €45 million since 2009
Last year ThyssenKrupp Steel Europe AG (Duisburg, Germany; www.thyssenkrupp-steel-europe.com) launched a new energy efficiency program to further reduce energy costs at all its production locations. The results of the saving measures are impressive. The potential identified so far at the…
Black & Veatch: Three new LNG projects in China
China Natural Gas Co. (CNGC; Beijing, China) has selected Black & Veatch (Overland Park, Kan.; www.bv.com) and Chemtex to provide engineering, procurement and construction services for three new liquefied natural gas plants in China. The new facilities will feature Black…
Bentley acquires SACS software for offshore structure analysis
Bentley Systems, Inc. (Exton, Pa., www.bentley.com) announced today that it has acquired the SACS business from Engineering Dynamics, Inc. SACS is an integrated finite-element, structural-analysis suite of programs that provides for the design, fabrication, installation, operations and maintenance of offshore…
CB&I: FEED contract for Sohar Refinery in Oman
CB&I (The Woodlands, Tex.; www.cbi.com) has been awarded a contract valued in excess of $40 million by the Oman Refineries and Petrochemical Co. for the front end engineering and design (FEED) and project management services for the Sohar Refinery Expansion…
Lanxess buys Syngenta’s Material Protection business
Lanxess AG (Leverkusen, Germany; www.lanxess.com) has agreed to acquire the Material Protection business of Syngenta AG (Basel, Switzerland; www.syngenta.com). As a result, the German specialty chemicals company will become one of the leading suppliers of biocides for construction materials. The…