Data collected and tabulated by the American Chemistry Council (ACC; Washington, D.C.; www.americanchemistry.com) show that the global chemical industry ended the first quarter on a soft note. The ACC’s Global Chemical Production Regional Index (Global CPRI) shows that global chemicals…
The following recently published titles may be relevant for chemical process industries (CPI) professionals: Biomass as Renewable Raw Material to Obtain Bioproducts of High-Tech Value. Edited by Valentin Popa and Irina Volf, Elsevier Press, 2018, e-book, $31.50 per chapter. Dealing…
Alpek S.A.B. de C.V. (San Pedro Garza Garcia, Mexico; www.alpek.com) announced that it completed the acquisition of Companhia Petroquímica de Pernambuco (Petroquímica Suape) and Companhia Integrada Têxtil de Pernambuco (Citepe) from Petróleo Brasileiro S.A. (Petrobras) through two of its wholly-owned…
Celanese Corp. (Dallas, Tex.; www.celanese.com) announced acetic acid and vinyl acetate monomer (VAM) capacity expansions and debottlenecking projects at the company’s global manufacturing facilities. At the company’s Clear Lake, Texas acetyls manufacturing facility, Celanese is on schedule to start up…
CarbonCure Technologies Inc. (Halifax, N.S., Canada; www.carboncure.com) has announced a strategic commercial relationship with Airgas, (Radnor, Pa.; www.airgas.com) an Air Liquide company, to collaborate and enhance the cement and concrete industry customer experience of adopting carbon dioxide (CO2) utilization technologies throughout the U.S. Gulf Coast region.…
Much is being said and written about the changes taking place in today's workforce. The conversation is often about the difficulty in finding and retaining talent, concerns about losing legacy knowledge as people retire, and the differences in work culture…
PET recycling Last month, Unilever N.V. (Rotterdam, the Netherlands.; www.unilever.com) announced a partnership with start-up company Ioniqa Technologies B.V. (Eindhoven, the Netherlands; www.ioniqa.com) and the polyethylene terephthalate (PET) resin producer Indorama Ventures plc (Bangkok, Thailand; www.indoramaventures.com) to pioneer a new…
A process that produces renewable hydrogen from organic biowaste and reduces the economic and environmental burden of wastewater treatment is being developed by Chemergy, Inc. (Miami Fla.; www.chemergy.com). Introduced at last month’s AIChE Spring Meeting (April 22–26; Orlando, Fla.), Chemergy’s…
Petroleum refiners looking to upgrade low-octane naphtha have an additional option using a process that increases the higher-octane iso-paraffins and aromatic compounds at lower costs than currently available alternatives. Most refiners currently upgrade naphtha by hydrotreating followed by isomerization and…
A new fermentation-based technology aims to create leather materials from yeast rather than animal skin. Developed by Modern Meadow (Nutley, N.J.; www.modernmeadow.com), the process feeds sugar feedstock to yeast cells that have been engineered to create collagen. Some additional enzymes…