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Innovation is alive and
well in the chemical industry
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The
ICIS Innovation Awards, recognising innovations in diverse sectors of the
chemical industry, were announced about a fortnight ago and point to a
vibrant industry where improvements to processes and products is very much
ongoing.
This
year’s awards recognise efforts spanning the entire chemical spectrum – large
volume petrochemicals, niche biochemicals, formulated products such as
speciality coatings & agrochemicals – as also technology development
efforts to minimise waste (industrial and municipal) and use it productively
to make value-added products. The awards recognise commercial efforts – not
just great ideas, but ones that have made the arduous journey to the
marketplace and so created significant impact in the real world.
AkzoNobel: Coating for cargo tanks of ships
The
overall winner and the ‘Best Product Innovation Award’ has been conferred on
coatings & speciality chemicals producer, AkzoNobel, for developing an
advanced coating system for the cargo tanks of ships. This is a novel epoxy
resin and curing system, called Interline 9001, which
undergoes a two-step curing – one at ambient temperature and the other at
high temperature – to give a very highly crosslinked resin that when coated
on the inner walls of chemicals-carrying vessels provides a significant
improvement in chemical resistance compared to conventional systems.
While
many formulation development efforts afford incremental or even substantial
gains over existing options, what impressed the judges was the quick
commercial impact that the technology was able to make: the coating has been
adopted by more than half of all new ship builds in 2016 – an impressive
achievement for a nascent technology. In all, more than 50 ships have been
coated with this system, and the product is now available worldwide to
ship-owners in Asia, the Middle East, Europe and the US.
The
benefits for the users – besides the enhanced chemical resistance for which
it was developed – include easy & quick cleaning; an improved
service-life; and lower environmental impact from the lesser disposal
(usually into the sea) of cleaning chemicals. These benefits make for a
compelling value proposition and are crucial for customers to make the effort
to change. The savings in materials, easier cleaning effort and reduced risks
of cross-contamination translate into substantial savings.
AkzoNobel
had earlier won the award for a marine coating for ship hulls that prevents
biofouling – a notorious problem for all fleet operators – even as it offered
significant environmental and economic advantages.
Dow Chemical: Proprietary propane dehydrogenation technology
Dow
Chemicals’ proprietary fluidised catalytic dehydrogenation (FCDh) technology
won the award in the ‘Best Innovation: Process Innovation’ category. This
breakthrough technology for manufacturing propylene – the second most
important olefin, after ethylene – from propane, is expected to play a major
role in bridging the likely gap in propylene needs. As the world, and
particularly the US, turns to lighter feedstock such as shale gas for steam
crackers, the amount of co-produced propylene is expected to lessen. Meeting
the needs will require the deployment of ‘on-purpose’ propylene production
technologies, of which propane dehydrogenation (PDH) is the most favoured.
Current
PDH processes that are commercially deployed, however, offer scope for
improvement, especially in terms of selectivity to propylene and conversion
rates. This is what the FCDh technology achieves: 45% propane conversion at
93% mole selectivity, with 20% capital savings on top of that. The novel
process also requires lower energy to operate per unit of propylene
production, which implies a smaller carbon footprint – important in a world
concerned with the consequences of global warming.
In
a departure from past practices, the new catalyst is more active (compared to
conventional PDH), and is regenerated more often in the process. This results
in lower capital costs, fewer limitations on increasing overall capacity,
higher efficiency and better operability. The frequent catalyst regeneration
also contributes to better catalyst performance during the time in use.
While
PDH is likely to be the first market the technology will aim to address, it
is a lot more versatile, and can contribute to enhancing efficiencies in the
production of several other petrochemicals where dehydrogenation is employed.
For example, the reactors can also be used to benefit ethylbenzene to styrene
conversions and for dehydrogenation of butane/isobutane to
butenes/isobutenes. Importantly, it can be retrofitted into existing or new
ethylene crackers for enhancing production of one or both olefins.
The
FDCh technology is expected to be first integrated into Dow’s own production
facilities for improving competitiveness, but is also likely to be available
for licensing.
Enerkem: waste to chemicals
Canada’s
Enerkem won the award in the category of ‘Innovation with Best Benefit for
the Environment and Sustainability’, for its municipal waste to chemicals
technology. The company operates a commercial-scale plant in Edmonton, Canada
that is based on a four-step thermochemical process: feedstock preparation;
gasification; cleaning & conditioning of the synthesis gas (syngas, a
mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen) produced; and finally catalytic
conversion of syngas to bio-methanol. The technology is versatile in the
sense that it can handle any type of organic waste – municipal, agricultural,
plastics, textiles etc. – but took 15 years to make it from an idea, to a
pilot, demonstration and eventually a commercial plant.
A
second commercial unit will soon commence operations in Quebec and there are
plans to take the technology to other countries including the US and
Netherlands. The technology will be particularly appropriate for a large and
populous country like India, which is grappling with mounting wastes in its
mega-cities, and scarce fossil resources for petrochemicals.
Ongoing
innovation efforts at the company are focussed on improving the efficiency of
the process, lowering capital & operating costs, and expanding the scope
of bio-based chemicals that can be made.
Genomatica: 1,3-butylene glycol from sugar
Genomatica’s
successful development of its GENO BG technology for making
1,3-butylene glycol from common sugars was also recognised in the category of
‘Innovation with Best Benefit for the Environment and Sustainability.’ The
biotech route, protected by more than 700 patents and applications, is
claimed by the company to be more sustainable that conventional
petrochemical-based routes because it uses renewable sugars, instead of acetaldehyde,
and gives a high purity product otherwise difficult to get.
The
branded ingredient, now available at fairly large scale for sampling, is
being targeted at niche applications in the personal care & cosmetic
industries. Companies operating here are increasingly valuing natural and
nature-derived chemicals over synthetic ones.
Muralidhar Ingale: cleaner process for CPC
The
awards this year have an India-connect as well. Mr. Muarlidhar Ingale,
Technical Director, Adroit Pharmachem (Vadodara, Gujarat), has been
recognised as the ‘Alpha Innovator of the Year: New Product
Development/Process Optimisation’ for developing a cost-effective process for
converting waste ammonia and carbon dioxide from copper phthalocyanine (CPC)
production into CPC intermediates.
The
innovation has great local relevance: India is the world’s leading producer
of CPC, with annual production volumes of about 60-kt – mostly in Gujarat.
But the process generates significant quantities of waste gases (mainly
ammonia and carbon dioxide), which are typically discharged as ammonium
carbonate after absorption in water. Dr. Ingale’s innovation that uses the
two gases more effectively, has several benefits for the pigment producers:
30% reduction in raw material technical urea use; up to 6.5% reduction in use
of cuprous chloride; and a 70% decline in the use of sulphuric acid (which
means less generation of solid wastes). The recapture of the nitrogen in
ammonia reduces the chemical oxygen demand (COD) of the wastewater by 20-40%,
and to top it the process results in 1-2% increase in CPC yields as well.
Dr.
Ingale’s technology has been operating successfully since 2014 at commercial
scale and he plans to license it to those interested.
Dr.
Mei Li, Senior Scientist, R&D, Dow AgroSciences was another individual
recognised for her successful efforts at design, implementation and
commercialisation of agrochemical formulations.
Ongoing effort
The
technology development journey in the chemical industry is an ongoing one.
Mature chemicals continue to see incremental improvements that may not mean
much in isolation but build-up over years to be significant. More and more
effort is centred around formulating existing materials to suit new
applications, reduce costs or environmental impacts. The biotechnology
industry is innovating novel routes using bacteria, algae, fungi etc. and has
seen great technical progress. But the greatest challenge that these efforts
face is acceptance in the marketplace. Not all make the cut, but those that
do have much to gain – including profitable growth in a competitive space!
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- Ravi Raghavan
CHWKLY24OCT17
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