A multidisciplinary project to scale up a system capable of simultaneously capturing carbon dioxide from fluegas and converting it to ethanol has received $1.9 million from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E; Washington, D.C.; arpa-e.energy.gov). The…
Mercury removal Scientists at Flinders University (Adelaide, Australia; www.flinders.edu.au) have further characterized their sulfur-limonene polysulfide polymer (Chem. Eng., December 2015, p. 12) to understand the conditions under which it can be used as a mercury sorbent. In a recent issue…
Developed two decades ago, Metso Outotec’s (MO; Helsinki, Finland; www.mogroup.com) Circored process is now being reintroduced as a proven way to help decarbonize the ironmaking process. Developed in the 1990s by the former Lurgi Metallurgie (now part of MO) and…
An expanding number of products are demonstrating the real-world feasibility of incorporating post-consumer polyethylene (PE) into asphalt paving for roadways and parking lots. The set of demonstration projects — part of the New End-Market Opportunities (NEMO) program, under the auspices…
Last month, Vale S.A. (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; www.vale.com) began construction on the first commercial plant to use its Tecnored process, which produces pig iron with biomass instead of metallurgical coal (coke). Located in Marabá, in the southeast of Pará,…
A technology initially developed in Australia by OPEC Systems (Emu Plains, NSW, Australia; www.opecsystems.com) for separating and concentrating per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in a range of water applications has now been introduced in North America. The technology, known as…
Researchers at Argonne National Laboratory (Lemont, Ill.; www.anl.gov) are investigating an electrochemical separation process known as capacitive deionization (CDI; diagram) to extract and recover ions from liquid streams in wide-ranging applications, including battery recycling and biomanufacturing. CDI holds several advantages…
To ensure product safety and quality, products containing lactose (at dairy plants, for example) are processed under hygienic conditions. These strict hygiene conditions require frequent cleaning of pneumatic transport systems — typically every eight weeks. This procedure is both labor-intensive…
A new category of electrolysis could significantly lower the expenses associated with producing “green” hydrogen. In the new capillary-fed electrolyzer cell — designed by Hysata (Wollongong, Australia; www.hysata.com) based on research from the University of Wollongong (www.uow.edu.au) — water is…
NITROGEN UTILIZATION Late March, the first nitrogen fertilizer produced from a wastewater-treatment plant sidestream was delivered to a farm in Sweden. The fertilizer was produced at a pilot plant that began operation last December at Ragn-Sells Högbytorp’s (www.ragensells.se) wastewater-treatment and…