Mobile Navigation

Processing & Handling

Focus on Valves

    This ball valve provides a high flow   Introduced last year, the 7G Series (photo) is a three-piece, 316-stainless-steel ball valve offered in two- and three-way configurations. The valve operates at pressures up to 3,000 psi, has a…

A vapor-phase glycerin-to-PG process slated for its commercial debut

Davy Process Technology Ltd. (DPT; London; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6898-531), a Johnson Matthey company, has received the first license of its new glycerin-to-propylene glycol (GTPG) process. The first project, planned for the Ashland/Cargill joint venture (CE, June, p. 10), will produce more than…

This solid catalyst may improve the economics of biodiesel fuel production

A new catalyst that promises to cut the cost of producing biodiesel fuel from vegetable oils and animal fats by 30% has been developed by Victor Lin, a chemistry professor at Iowa State University (Ames, Iowa; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6898-537). The solid catalyst…

Member Exclusive

An economical way to extract more alumina from bauxite

Alumina refining by the Bayer process involves the digestion of bauxite ore with caustic soda, which produces “green liquor,” from which alumina is recovered, and a bauxite residue, called red mud, which is stored in large disposal areas. A typical…

Ni-Rh nanowires show promise as new catalysts

A research team from Austria and Sweden have demonstrated that nanowires of a nickel-rhodium alloy exhibit a suprisingly high reactivity to oxygen. Using physical vapor deposition, the researchers have produced quasi one-dimensional rows of Ni atoms on a single-crystal rhodium…

Nutritious rice

At the end of June, Wuxi NutriRice Co. Ltd. — a joint venture of DSM (Sittard, Netherlands; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6898-550) and Bühler AG (Uzwil, Switzerland; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6898-551) — opened the world’s first facility for producing nutritionally enriched rice. Production at the site will…

Member Exclusive

Solar polysilicon

Wacker Chemie AG (Munich, Germany; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6898-552) plans to build the first commercial-scale plant for the production of granular polysilicon for the solar industry at its Berghausen, Germany, site. The 650-m.t./yr facility is expected to start up by the end of…

Focus on Pristine Equipment & Systems

    These helical mixing elements are for several process applications Kenics Sanitary Static Mixers (photo) perform efficient, cost-effective handling of processing applications such as blending, dispersion and heating or cooling. Continuous inline mixing is achieved with no moving parts,…

German scientists overcome 100-year old law of physics

Max Planck Innovation GmbH (Garching by Munich; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6897-536), the technology transfer agency of the Max Planck Society, has signed a co-exclusive license agreement with Leica Microsystems (Wetzlar) and Carl Zeiss MicroImaging GmbH (Göttingen, all Germany) for the RESOLFT (reversible saturable…

Member Exclusive

Jet spinning  

At the end of May, Teijin Twaron B.V. (Arnhem, Netherlands; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6897-543) opened a new pilot-production plant for producing a new generation of Twaron para-aramides pulp using a new jet-spinning process. The company did not disclose process details except to say…