Environment, Health, Safety & Security
Engineering Practice: Accurate Wetted Areas For Partially Filled Vessels
This article introduces a simple yet accurate way to calculate the wetted surface area of a partially filled horizontal vessel with semi-elliptical heads. This information is often needed for the sizing of relief devices. API Recommended Practice 521 specifies that…
Focus On: Gas Detection
A gas analyzer suitable for hazardous areas Now approved by ATEX and CSA-C/US certifications, the X-Stream flameproof process gas analyzer is suitable for Class I, Zone 1 and Group IIB + H 2 hazardous areas without the need for pressurization…
Chementator: A Way to Convert Depleted Oil Wells into Natural-Gas Wells
The amount of crude oil remaining in depleted oil fields has been estimated to be about 50 – 80% of the total estimated oil reserves. In the past, CO2 has been injected into such wells for enhanced-oil recovery — a…
Chementator: This Membrane Mimics Mother Nature to Separate CO2
A plastic membrane that allows CO2 and other small molecules to move through its pores while largely preventing the movement of larger molecules like CH4, has been developed by a team of researchers from CSIRO Materials Science and Engineering and…
Chementator: Carbon Capture
NRG Energy, Inc. (Princeton, N.J.) and Powerspan Corp. (Portsmouth, N.H.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6902-541) plan to demonstrate, at commercial scale, Powerspan’s ECO2 technology for capturing CO2 from conventional coal-fired power plants. To date, CO2 -capture demonstrations on coal plants have been conducted at…
Chementator: Fuel from Rubber Seeds
In Malaysia, the raw material for biodiesel production has been palm oil. However, making biodiesel can conflict with the oil’s use as food, and growing palm oil (even for food) has caused the destruction of tropical forests in Borneo, Sumatra…
Chementator: Coal-Mine Vent Air
Megtec Systems (Glen Waverly, Victoria, Australia; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6902-542) has announced the first power plant fueled by methane emissions from coal-mine ventilation air. Traditionally, CH4 released during coal excavation requires dilution in ventilation air because it is explosive at concentrations between 5…
EPA settlement
American Electric Power (AEP, Columbus, Ohio; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6901-541) has agreed to cut its emissions of air pollutants by 813,000 ton/yr at an estimated cost of more than $4.6 billion in a settlement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA, Washington D.C.)…
Air-pollution control
Global revenues for suppliers of air-pollution-control systems, services, consumables and components will reach $80 billion by 2015, up from about $50 billion in 2007, according to a survey by McIlvaine Co. (Northfield, Ill.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6901-540). The market will be driven by…
Solar cells
A program to develop ionic liquids and formulations to improve the performance and efficiency of solar cells has been initiated by BASF AG (Ludwigshafen, Germany) and G24 Innovations, Ltd. (G24i; Cardiff, Wales; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6901-545). G24i produces photovoltaic cells that use the…