The dramatic jump in petroleum and natural gas prices over the recent years has created much impetus to reduce operating costs at chemical process plants. In processes that use either oil or gas for feedstock, such reduction can…
Energy consciousness and environmental awareness have transformed condensate from an inexpensive byproduct of steam distribution to a valuable resource that can substantially reduce operating costs. For process systems that use steam as the heat transfer media, improved condensate…
Last September, on-specification, polymer-grade ethylene was produced by the first grassroots unit to utilize an ethylene recovery technology that was jointly developed by ABB Lummus Global (Bloomfield, N.J.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6518-537) and the China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. (Sinopec, Beijing; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6518-538). The…
The process industries are extensive users of energy. But it is now clearly established that a large amount of this energy is wasted, essentially in the form of heat rejected to the environment through gaseous or liquid effluents.…
This month, JFE Steel Corp. (Tokyo, Japan; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6517-532) started up a new production plant that produces 100 m.t./yr of solar-grade (SOG) silicon (Si) from crude Si metal. The company also started to design a 500-1,000-m.t./yr plant for making SOG Si,…
Researchers at Kanagawa University (Yokohama, Japan; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6517-535) have developed a three-phase emulsification technology for making stable emulsions of diesel-fuel oil in water. Tests with the emulsion (involving a 30-ton truck) show that fuel-combustion efficiency is increased by 10-15% compared to…
The first demonstration of a new high-temperature-superconducting cable was started last month in Columbus, Ohio. The new triax cable - said to provide three times more power-distribution capacity while using half of the superconducting material, compared to previous superconducting cable…
Brown coal accounts for about half the world’s coal reserves. Although it contains less ash and sulfur than bituminous, brown coal contains more water, which reduces its heating value. To take advantage of this “greener” source of fuel, Kobe Steel…
QuestAir Technologies Inc. (Vancouver, B.C.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6516-534) has received a CDN$2.2-million order from ExxonMobil (Houston, Tex.) for the construction of a prototype H-6200 hydrogen purifier to be demonstrated at an ExxonMobil petroleum refinery. The H-6200 is based on QuestAir’s proprietary Rapid-Cycle,…
Lurgi AG (Frankfurt; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6516-535) and the Karlsruhe Research Center (both Germany; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6516-536) have signed a cooperation contract to construct a pilot plant for producing liquid fuels from biomass. As the first of three steps, Lurgi will build a €3.76-million pyrolysis…