Latest News: Technologies
Advanced Coatings for New Applications
Changing markets and new applications are putting more demands on the protective coatings industry than ever before. While developing environmentally friendlier and less labor-intensive corrosion- and chemical-resistant paints and coatings is always a major goal, new formulations are needed to…
Profitable potential for trash-to-liquids process
A group at Texas A&M University (College Station, Tex.; www.tamu.edu) is developing a process that converts organic municipal solid waste (MSW) into straight-chain alkanes, a primary component in gasoline. The four-step process (diagram) begins with a proven industrial waste-sorting method…
Making renewable diesel and biopropane from vegetable oil
Before the end of 2016, Neste Oil Oyj’s (Espoo, Finland; www.nesteoil.com) refinery in Rotterdam, the Netherlands will start producing 30,000–40,000 ton/yr of biopropane. The feedstock is a sidestream from the company’s 800,000-ton/yr renewable diesel-fuel plant. The refinery, which started up…
Refinery project combines upgrading with EOR and CCS
Construction has begun on a unique refinery project that will convert Canadian bitumen into ultralow-sulfur diesel while producing high-purity CO2 for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) and subsequent carbon capture and sequestration (CCS). The project, located near Edmonton, Alta. and run…
Cut O2-production costs in half with this PSA technology
A high-temperature pressure-swing-absorption (HT-PSA) process that reduces energy consumption by up to 50% compared to conventional PSA technology is being developed by Tokyo Gas Co. (Tokyo, Japan; www.tokyo-gas.co.jp), with support from the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO).…
Partnership targets bio-based building blocks from CO2
AkzoNobel N.V. (www.akzonobel.com) has partnered with Dutch start-up company Photanol (both Amsterdam, the Netherlands; www.photanol.com) to manufacture specialty chemicals using a photosynthesis-like process that combines sugar production with fermentation in a single organism. Photanol has developed genetically engineered cyanobacteria that…
A waterless hydraulic-fracturing technique gets field-tested
A method for using liquid CO2, rather than water, as a hydraulic fracturing fluid has been field-tested in a mid-continent oil well, and has benefited well productivity, according to developer Praxair Inc. (Danbury, Conn.; www.praxair.com). Aside from enhanced well performance,…
A new carrier for MBBR technology
Last month, Veolia Water Technologies (Birmingham, England; www.veoliawaterst.co.uk) introduced a new generation of biofilm carriers for moving-bed biofilm reactors (MBBRs). Trade-named AnoxKaldness Z-MBBR, the new carrier is the result of two decades of development work, says the company. Unlike conventional…
Slash energy costs with this new electrowinning anode
The research group of Masatsugu Morimitsu at Doshisha University (Kyoto, Japan; www.doshisha.ac.jp) has developed an “evolutionary” electrowinning process for the production of rare and base metals that promises to reduce both the power consumption and environmental burden. The process features…
November Chementator Briefs
Graphene continues to show new, promising properties Researchers from Monash University (Melbourne, Australia; www.monash.edu.au) have discovered that graphene oxide sheets can change their structure and become liquid droplets spontaneously. Because graphene droplets change their structure in response to an…