Latest News: Technologies
An inexpensive iron catalyst for efficient hydrogenation reactions
The research group of Yasuhiro Uozumi and Yoichi Yamada at Riken (Saitama, Japan; www.riken.jp), in collaboration with professor Audrey Moores of McGill University (Montreal, Que.), has developed a highly efficient catalyst for performing hydrogenation reactions, which are important in the…
A one-pot process to pretreat and saccharify biomass
Researchers from the U.S. Dept. of Energys Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI; Emeryville, Calif.; www.jbei.org) have reported the first demonstration of a one-pot, wash-free process for the ionic-liquid pretreatment and saccharification of switchgrass — a leading potential biofuel feedstock. By combining…
Successful implementation of a new extractive-distillation technology for aromatics recovery
AMT International Inc. (Plano, Texas; www.amtintl.com) and LG Chem, Ltd. (Seoul, Korea; www.lgchem.com) have successfully converted an existing sulfolane liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) unit at LG Chem’s Yeosu plant using a new extractive-distillation (ED) process for aromatics recovery. This technology was…
Cement technology increases strength and lowers emissions footprint
Cement manufacturing is a major source of greenhouse gas emissions due to two factors: carbon dioxide is released when calcium carbonate calcines to lime (CaO) in the cement manufacturing process; and cement kilns are operated at temperatures of 1,500°C, which…
A direct, one-step enzymatic hydroxylation of benzene to phenol
The selective, one-step biocatalytic hydroxylation of benzene to phenol — at ambient pressure and temperature — has been demonstrated by professors Yoshihito Watanabe and Osamu Shoji at Nagoya University (Nagoya, Japan; bioinorg.chem.nagoya-u.ac.jp). The achievement was made using a wild-type of…
September Chementator Briefs
Solar steam The Middle East’s first solar enhanced-oil-recovery (EOR) project was recently commissioned by Petroleum Development Oman (PDO; Muscat, Oman; www.pdo.co.om). The project uses Enclosed Trough technology from GlassPoint (Fremont, Calif.; www.glasspoint.com) to produce an average of 50 ton/d of…
Some bacteria are not inactivated by ultrasound; here’s why
Although the inactivation of bacteria by high-power ultrasound has been extensively studied, the relationship between the effectiveness of ultrasound to inactivate bacteria and their physico-chemical properties is not yet well understood, says Muthupandian Ashokkumar, professor at the University of Melbourne…
Ice pigging for the CPI
Launched this month at drinktec (Trade Fair for the Beverage and Liquid Food Industry; September 16–20; Munich, Germany), Eco-IcePush is a new technology for recovering products during equipment purging, and is being offered by GEA Process Engineering A/S (Søborg, Denmark),…
A step toward ammonia production at ambient conditions
Many investigations are ongoing to achieve ammonia synthesis at energy-saving mild conditions instead of the high temperatures and pressures (500°C, 300 atm) required by the commonly used Haber-Bosch process, which consumes more than 1% of the world’s power production. Now,…
Ceramic membranes and O3 combine to treat wastewater
High fluxes and micro-contaminant reduction have been achieved in a 2.5-m3/h pilot plant to test the performance of ceramic membranes and ozonation in treating wastewater at Melbourne Water’s (www.melbournewater.com.au) Eastern Treatment Plant. The project, to be completed in a few…