Evonik’s triple-digit million-euro facility is the first unit worldwide to manufacture industrial-scale quantities of rhamnolipid biosurfactants. These biosurfactants are already transforming the cleaning, beauty and personal care industries and have huge potential in many other applications.

This smart technology has been in the news for quite some time but how useful is it for industrial plants? Bart Moors, General Manager Process Industries Software at Siemens and Prathamesh Gawde, Senior Product Marketing Manager at Bentley Systems highlight the many benefits of adopting the digital twin technology across industrial facilities.

The green hydrogen plant is being developed at Taguatinga and will be powered by a photovoltaic plant in order to support the decarbonization of sectors that are difficult to electrify.

Under a Joint Development Agreement, Sasol, Anglo American and De Beers will work together to generate feedstock for the production of renewable diesel in South Africa.

OMV Petrom has begun construction work for developing a sustainable aviation fuel and renewable diesel (HVO) production unit at the Petrobrazi refinery in Brazi, Romania. On completion, the project is expected to have an annual capacity of 250,000 tons.

Under a MOU signed between Uniper and Kyuden, both the companies will work together to explore collaboration in hydrogen and ammonia trading activities, renewable energy and carbon capture utilization and storage related activities.

The four Covestro sites that are now running completely on renewable energy are all based in the USA and include the sites of Channelview, Texas; South Deerfield, Massachusetts; New Martinsville, West Virginia and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

With an aim to strengthen the competitiveness and modernization of the EU chemical sector, the European Commission has presented an Action Plan for the Chemicals Industry. The Action Plan focusses on key challenges such as high energy costs, unfair global competition, and weak demand as well as promotes investment in innovation and sustainability.

A new study by Renewable Carbon Initiative and the Biobased Industries Consortium has mentioned that biomass can meet 20 % of carbon demand in the chemicals sector by 2050 without compromising food and feed supply.

Saipem has secured a mega EPC contract from Enilive for expanding its Venice biorefinery in Italy. The project comprises of increasing the plant's capacity from the existing 400,000 to 600,000 tons per year and the production of sustainable aviation fuel.