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Business News: September 2025
Plant Watch Chevron Phillips Chemical completes LV PAO expansion in Belgium August 12, 2025 — Chevron Phillips Chemical L.P. (CPChem; The Woodlands, Tex.; www.cpchem.com) has completed the expansion of its low-viscosity polyalphaolefins (LV PAO) production unit in Beringen, Belgium, significantly…
Avenues for Decarbonizing the Steel Industry
Energy- and carbon-intensive, steel production is categorized as one of the most “hard-to-abate” industries, making the scaleup of decarbonization technologies crucial not only for steelmakers themselves, but for every downstream industry in the supply chain Responsible for some 9% of…
A platform technology for low-carbon cement makes progress
Two recent developments at Queens Carbon Inc. (Pine Brook, N.J.; www.queenscarbon.com), a spinoff company from Rutgers University (New Brunswick, N.J.; www.rutgers.edu), illustrate the potential for reducing the high carbon-dioxide emissions that result from cement and concrete production. Both are results…
Focus On: Pumps
A dispenser for abrasive and viscous fluids NEMO dispensers (photo) are designed for precise dosing and metering of abrasive and viscous fluids. With the ability to handle a wide range of viscosities, shear-sensitive materials and entrained solids, NEMO dispensers deliver…
Carbon dioxide removal combined with desalination
Most existing carbon-dioxide removal (CDR) approaches have focused on air, but the volumetric concentration of dissolved inorganic CO2 in surface water is much higher (150X) than its concentration in the atmosphere. Removing CO2 from water could prove to be a…
Editor’s page: Welcome to Chemical Engineering
This month’s column gives a brief overview of the Chemical Engineering brand. While long-term readers need no introduction to the magazine, newer readers might be interested in the history of the magazine and what we cover. Perhaps even long-term readers…
Switchable solvent supports freshwater extraction from hypersaline brine
Extremely high-salinity water streams present difficulties for many types of processing equipment, such as membranes and filters, and most commercial treatment methods involve thermal evaporators or crystallization, which are energy-intensive and require special anti-corrosion materials. A new membrane-less, non-evaporative process…
This process can fully mineralize PFAS with no toxic byproducts
Breaking the stable carbon-fluorine bonds within per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) is one of the most significant challenges in mitigating persistent PFAS pollution. The Hydrothermal Alkaline Technology (HALT; diagram), invented at the Colorado School of Mines (Golden, Colo.; www.mines.edu) and…
Novel reactor addresses limitations of pyrolysis for plastics recycling
Pyrolysis has received much attention as a technology capable of breaking down waste plastics in recycling processes, but existing pyrolysis approaches often give rise to products with broad molar mass distributions and poor yields. Catalysts can improve yield and selectivity,…
New reactor supports organic-assisted electrolysis for green hydrogen
The production of “green” hydrogen via electrolysis is seen as a key decarbonization pathway for certain industry sectors, but its efficiency can be hampered by a number of factors, including the accumulation of gas bubbles on electrode surfaces within electrolyzers…