PROCESS Worldwide brings to you the ‘Top 10 plant engineering projects of October 2022’ from all over the world. Right from the world’s first demo plant for electrically heated steam cracker furnaces taking off to Dow and Mura developing Europe’s largest advanced recycling plant in Germany, find out all the projects making headlines here.

Time is running out! We have to get our greenhouse emissions under control and eliminate it completely before it’s too late. The effects of climate change are already beginning to appear and, in this background, the most carbon-intensive sectors have undertaken sustainable business strategies to achieve their net zero goals but is it going to be enough? PROCESS Worldwide lists down four progressive solutions that will help industries to decarbonize their operations.

The detailed study shows how to set up external lubrication equipment by analyzing the process parameters’ importance and impact on production using a double-side rotary tablet press thus, minimizing time losses.

With chemical and chemical processing industries aiming to forge ahead in their automation and digitalization drive to develop their respective ‘Factory of the future’ or ‘Smart factory’, one thing is certain – it can’t be done without the use of robots at least for the time being. The concept of robots is not new but they have been transformed time and again to meet the challenges of today’s industrial plants especially with regard to plant inspection as well as maintenance and it won’t be wrong to term this phase as the ‘return and rise of robots.’

E-crackers are the next big thing within the chemical process industry as it has the potential to reduce CO2 emissions by as much as 90 %. The transition of this core industrial process has already begun with leading petrochemical companies looking to establish pilot e-cracker plants across Europe. PROCESS Worldwide revisits its ‘Progress on E-Cracking’ article by highlighting the top 3 e-cracker projects in the news this year.

With sales of more than 2 trillion euros (2.26 trillion dollars; 2020), China is by far the largest chemical producer in the world. Even though growth has slowed from an average of 8.7 to 5.7 percent in recent years, this figure is still very impressive by global standards. This is also true for investments in property, plant and equipment, which amounted to 115 billion euros in 2020. Based on our China Market Insider series, we have summarized some interesting market trends and developments in China's chemical industry this year.

Leaders from the process automation industry came together at the recently organized Namur meeting which was once again held as a virtual event this year. MTP, NOA, APL, and robots were the core topics discussed at the meeting. PROCESS has summarized the exciting two-day event.

Trinamix’s handheld Mobile NIR Spectroscopy Solution which can identify more than 30 different plastics on the spot is now accompanied by a new application which has the ability to distinguish between Pet-A and Pet-G.

The 4th ‘China International Import Expo (CIIE)’ showed where the chemical industry in China is heading. At the beginning of November, while climate negotiations were taking place in Glasgow, keywords such as ‘low carbon,’ ‘green,’ or ‘circular economy’ also dominated the presentations of Chinese and international chemical companies at the Expo in Shanghai.

China's largest MDI producer, Wanhua Chemical, continues to expand its market share. The company already dominates the global MDI market ahead of Covestro and BASF. It will continue to expand its capacities in the coming years, reports the Chinese chemical newspaper Zhongguo Huagong Xinxi Zhoukan. What does this mean for the global market?