Mobile Navigation

Environment, Health, Safety & Security

The Globally Harmonized System

When the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) revised the U.S. Hazard Communication Law, U.S. 29 CFR 1910.1200, in May of 2012, it set off an avalanche of change in the environmental, health and safety (EH&S) circles of American…

First commercial-scale high-solids anaerobic digester in North America

Harvest Power (Waltham, Mass.; www.harvestpower.com) recently began operation of the first commercial-scale, high-solids anaerobic digester in North America. The facility produces biogas from food waste and yard waste in Richmond, B.C., Canada. “The anaerobic digester employs essentially the same biology…

Piping Design for Potentially Lethal Chemicals

Working in close proximity to the high pressures and temperatures commonly found in the chemical process industries (CPI) is cause enough for concern over a person’s wellbeing; but working in close proximity to chemicals that are considered toxic, hazardous or…

A repeat near miss

It is with extreme reticence that I author this page, even though I received permission several months ago to do so. FRI had a near miss in 2010, which was identical to a near miss that occurred in 2007. In…

Scaleup for a CO2 mineralization process

A pilot plant will be established at the University of Newcastle (Newcastle, Australia; www.newcastle.edu.au) to test a new technology for the sequestration of CO2 through mineral carbonation — the reaction with magnesium silicate minerals, such as serpentine, to form mineral…

A ‘new’ concept for CO2 capture: birds’ lungs

Researchers at the University of California Irvine (UCI, Irvine CA; www.chem.uci.edu) have taken a cue from nature in devising a way to remove carbon dioxide from fluegas. They are developing a synthetic membrane based on the design and function of…

Ceramic membranes and O3 combine to treat wastewater

High fluxes and micro-contaminant reduction have been achieved in a 2.5-m3/h pilot plant to test the performance of ceramic membranes and ozonation in treating wastewater at Melbourne Water’s (www.melbournewater.com.au) Eastern Treatment Plant. The project, to be completed in a few…

Focus on Safety Equipment

Newson Gale Avert static electricity buildup with this hose-continuity tester The OhmGuard Hose-Continuity Tester is designed to continuously ensure that a string of assembled hoses are safely grounded to the transferring vehicle during operations that may produce potentially combustible gas,…

A solid way to eliminate contaminants from wastewater

CSIRO Minerals Down Under Flagship (Perth, Western Australia; www.csiro.au/MDU) has developed a method that uses hydrotalcite formation to simultaneously remove contaminants from mining and industrial wastewaters in a single step. Current wastewater-treatment processes typically produce lime-based slurries, often with large…

A gas turbine with low NOx emissions

NEDO  and Hitachi Ltd. (Tokyo, www.hitachi.com) have developed a new combustion technology that could reduce the emissions of oxides of nitrogen (NOx) to below 10 ppm without the addition of diluents. As part of the CCS-IGCC project (carbon capture and…