Eneos and Preferred Networks (PFN) have achieved a breakthrough in autonomous plant operations by successfully operating a butadiene extraction unit autonomously for two consecutive days by making use of a new artificial intelligence system at Eneos Kawasaki Refinery's petrochemical plant in Japan.

Linde Engineering has officially started up the world’s first full-scale pilot plant in Dormagen, Germany, to showcase how hydrogen can be separated from natural gas streams using Linde’s Hiselect powered by Evonik membrane technology.

Trinseo has teamed up with global technology provider Synova and global engineering services company Worley to establish the mega chemical recycling plant which is expected to process 15 kilotons of recycled polystyrene flakes every year. The flakes will then be converted into high quality recycled styrene to enable further production of polystyrene.

Ineos Styrolution has sold its StyLight thermoplastic composite materials business to Ensinger. With this move, Ensinger intends to become one of the only manufacturers to offer the complete value chain of thermoplastic composite products.

Plug Power has been chosen by Fertiglobe’s green hydrogen consortium to deliver a world-scale 100 MW electrolyzer in Egypt. Claimed to become one of the largest ‘independently owned’ facility in the world, the electrolyzer will produce up to 90,000 tons of green hydrogen as feedstock for green ammonia production at EBIC in Egypt.

Wood has plans to use autonomous robots for the purpose of inspection and maintenance of offshore as well as onshore oil and gas infrastructure assets in the Canadian Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. The move will enable the operators to undertake timely decisions, improve the safety of personnel, and also reduce carbon-emissions.

BP’s ‘HyGreen Teesside’ project will produce 60 MWe of green hydrogen by 2025 with a potential to increase the production to 500Mwe ‎by 2030. With this project and in addition to the other existing project by the company i.e. the blue hydrogen project (H2Teesside), UK’s Teesside region is all set to become the country’s leading hydrogen hub to decarbonize industry ‎and heavy transport.

French President Emmanuel Macron and Eastman Board Chair and CEO Mark Costa announced Eastman’s plan to invest up to $1 billion in a material-to-material molecular recycling facility in France. This facility would use Eastman’s polyester renewal technology to recycle up to 160,000 metric tonnes annually of hard-to-recycle plastic waste that is currently being incinerated.

A global survey conducted by Yokogawa has unveiled that industrial autonomy will have a significant impact on environmental sustainability in the background of the increasing number of industrial autonomy projects across the globe.

Lanxess is expanding its production capacity for the active ingredient Preventol CMK (chlorocresol) at the Krefeld-Uerdingen, Germany, site by around 50 percent in response to the continuing strong demand for disinfectants and industrial preservation. The specialty chemicals company has invested a single-digit million euro amount for the expansion, which will be completed still in the first quarter of 2022.