The demand for “green” methanol as a low-carbon fuel is rising, making it a valuable commodity, as well as a promising avenue for waste-carbon utilization, especially since it can be readily produced from “stranded” carbon sources, such as flare gas.…
Steam is commonly used across the chemical process industries (CPI) for a variety of end uses, including process heating, mechanical drive, moderation of chemical reactions and fractionation of hydrocarbons. Heat exchangers, turbines, fractionating towers, stripping columns, and reaction vessels are…
Henry Kister shares lessons learned from troubleshooting distillation towers This conversation started in a course I was presenting in Sydney, Australia. I was about 15 minutes into my presentation when a delegate from a major petroleum refinery stopped me. “How…
Air Liquide (Paris, France; www.airliquide.com) recently announced a renewable hydrogen production project at TotalEnergies (Courbevoie, France; www.totalenergies.com) La Mède (Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in France) site. In the context of a long-term contract, Air Liquide will cover the hydrogen needs of…
Cyclyx International, LLC (Portsmouth, N.H.; www.10to90.com), a post-use plastic-to-feedstock innovator and joint venture among Agilyx (Oslo, Norway; www.agilyx.com), ExxonMobil (Spring, Tex.; www.exxonmobil.com), and LyondellBasell (Rotterdam, the Netherlands; www.lyondellbasell.com), has reached a final investment decision for a second Cyclyx Circularity Center…
INNIO Group (Jenbach, Austria; www.innio.com) today announced that it was awarded the COGEN Europe Recognition Award 2024 in the Technology and Innovation category for its 1 MW-class hydrogen combined heat and power (CHP) plant. Powered by green hydrogen, INNIO Group…
NextChem (Maire; Milan, Italy; www.nextchem.com) unveiled today its new high-tech engineering center, the “NX Engineering District”, in Catania, Sicily, in a ceremony attended by the local political and institutional leaders. The NX Engineering District, in Sicily’s Science and Technology Park,…
Clariant AG (Muttenz, Switzerland; www.clariant.com), a sustainability-focused specialty chemical company, today announced that its MegaMax catalyst was selected for a China’s biomass gasification-to-green methanol project. The plant will use a combination of farm waste and wind power to produce up…
The preliminary value for the CE Plant Cost Index® (CEPCI) for September 2024 (most recent available) decreased slightly compared to the previous month’s value. The decline — the third consecutive monthly decrease — was driven mostly by a fall in…
Periodic analysis of heat-transfer fluids (HTFs) is among the most neglected practices in industrial settings. But over time in operation, HTFs can and do accumulate contaminants from the heat transfer system and also undergo chemical changes that negatively affect the…