Latest News: Technologies
This self-sustaining cell makes electrolysis more practical
A team of researchers from Idaho National Laboratory (INL; Idaho Falls; www.inl.gov) has developed a new electrode material that simplifies hydrogen generation and energy storage via protonic, ceramic electrochemical cells (PCECs). Conventional electrolysis technologies use electricity to efficiently split water,…
Anti-fouling pre-treatment for membranes
Researchers at the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST; Seoul, South Korea; www.kist.re.kr) led by Seongpil Jeong have developed a pre-treatment method for membrane distillation desalination processes that involves adding magnesium to seawater to prevent scale formation (anti-fouling) on…
An alternative crop for bioethanol
The Agave tequilana plant, which is native to Mexico and used to make the popular drink tequila, promises significant advantages over sugarcane and corn as a source of bioethanol. The Agave plant is now being grown as a biofuel source…
Chementator Briefs
Biofertilizer + biogas Three new biofertilizer-biogas facilities will be built in the Zachodniopomorskie region of Poland. The plants are being built by Ductor Oy (Helsinki, Finland; www.ductor.com), a Finnish-Swiss biotechnology company funded by Esperotia Investments Ltd. The plants will use…
Filtering out and detoxifying hexavalent chromium from water
Chemists from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL; Switzerland; www.epfl.ch) have developed “sponges” designed to capture various target substances, such as gold, mercury and lead, dissolved in solution. Now, they have developed one for capturing toxic hexavalent chromium…
New process for safer and continuous magnesium production to be piloted
Because of its abundance, light weight and easy alloying, magnesium metal has great potential for components in the automotive, aerospace and military industries. However, the two existing magnesium production processes — the Pidgeon process from ore and electrolytic process from…
A new trace-moisture analyzer harnesses the power of MOFs
The presence of moisture — even in very small amounts — can be extremely detrimental the manufacture of many products, including semiconductors. Removal of moisture from a contaminated process is a labor-intensive process that requires large volumes of high-purity gases.…
Chementator Briefs
Light-emitting Si Researchers from Eindhoven University of Technology (TUE; the Netherlands; www.tue.nl) have developed an alloy with silicon that can emit light. Together with researchers from the universities of Jena, Linz and Munich, the researchers combined silicon and germanium in…
A low-cost way to make propylene oxide without chlorine or wastewater
Chemetry Corp. (Moss Landing, Calif.; www.chemetrycorp.com) is piloting a hybrid electrochemical-catalysis process for making propylene oxide (PO) that eliminates some of the major production hurdles associated with chlorohydrin-based PO production. “The traditional chlorohydrin process produces about 47 tons of wastewater…
An efficient electrochemical route to triphenylphosphine — without the waste
A new electrochemical process could make triphenylphosphine (TPP) — an important reagent in many organic transformations — more practical for industrial use. Synthesizing TPP results in large volumes of waste in the form of triphenylphosphine oxide (TPPO), which is very…