A next-generation, carbon-enhanced membrane-bioreactor (MBR) system improves treatment of industrial wastewater with high organic content and containing compounds that resist microbial breakdown. The system allows economic reuse of wastewater or discharge to meet stringent environmental standards. The new MBR, dubbed…
Last month, Pittsburgh Iron Oxides, LLC (Pirox; New Brighton, Pa.; www.piroxllc.com) was granted U.S. patent No. 7,744,848 for its process of producing high-purity magnetite (Fe3O4). The company produces synthetic magnetite, tradenamed SuperMagnetite, which has greater than 99% purity and exhibits…
Flyanic LLC (Newark, N.J.; www.flyanic.com) has developed an industrial-scale and economical process for grinding cement, flyash and other cementitious materials to a median particle size of 1 micron, making them suitable for use in concrete and mortar. For example, flyash…
The research group of Kazuo Tajima at Kanagawa University (Yokohama, Japan; apchem2.kanagawa-u.ac.jp) have developed a new emulsification process that enables biodiesel fuels (BDFs) to be used without any purification process, thereby reducing production costs by one fourth. Tajima estimates that…
Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Mechanics of Materials (IWM; Halle, Germany; www.fraunhofer.de) have developed ceramic membranes with uniform pore structure and tight pore-size distribution, which makes them more stable and delivers considerably higher flowrates than existing ceramic membranes, which…
Strata Technology Ltd. (Sunbury-on-Thames, U.K.; www.stratatec.co.uk) has commercialized the Cambridge Multipass Rheometer (MPR), which was developed by professor Malcolm Mackley at the Dept. of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, Cambridge University (www.ceb.cam.ac.uk) for advanced studies of the rheological properties of melts,…
ADA-ES, Inc. (Littleton, Colo.; www.adaes.com) and Arch Coal, Inc. (St. Louis, Mo.), the U.S.’s second-largest coal producer, have signed an exclusive development and licensing agreement for an ADA-ES process that reduces mercury emissions from coal-fired plants by pretreating the coal.…
Graphene Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI; Troy, N.Y.; www.rpi.edu) have developed an inexpensive way to produce large quantities of graphene. Using acid treatment and ultrasound, the method is a step toward mass production of the atom-thick, honeycomb-shaped nanomaterial,…
Dow Water and Process Solutions (DW&PS; Minneapolis, Minn.; www.dowwaterandprocess.com), a business unit of The Dow Chemical Co., unveiled a simplified electrodeionization (EDI) product at the recent Singapore International Water Week event. The new version of the product reduces operating costs…
Calsmelt Pty Ltd. (Melbourne, Australia; www.calsmelt.com) is marketing a new carbothermic process for producing metallic aluminum. Tradenamed Thermical, the process is said to entail significant advantages over Alcoa’s carbothermic process, the Advanced Reactor Process (ARP). Under development for several years,…