
Sulphuric acid recycling
As producers and regulators become increasingly concerned about the ‘circular economy’, there is increasing focus on regenerating waste sulphuric acid for re-use.
As producers and regulators become increasingly concerned about the ‘circular economy’, there is increasing focus on regenerating waste sulphuric acid for re-use.
In this case study AGRU Kunststofftechnik reports on how a new condenser design, engineered by OMV and INWA AG using PFA sheets from AGRU, was implemented at OMV refinery in Austria to address maintenance problems due to corrosion of the wet sulphuric acid (WSA) condensers and the follow-up units.
A new burner design for the combustion of natural gas with either combustion air or pure oxygen as the oxidiser has been developed by CS Combustion Solutions. The new Oxijet®-Burner has been designed to perform both start-up and main operation functions with one burner.
While phosphate fertilizer production represents the main slice of demand for elemental sulphur and sulphuric acid, sulphur fertilizers continue to be a growing sector of demand due to changes in the way that we use sulphur.
CRU’s Sulphur + Sulphuric Acid 2023 Conference and Exhibition takes place at the Sheraton New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, 6-8 November.
Adani Enterprises says that its new greenfield copper smelter at Mundra in Gujarat, being developed by its subsidiary Kutch Copper Ltd, will begin operations in March 2024. The $1.1 billion project will have an annual production capacity of 1 million t/a of copper once the second phase is complete, but the March 24 start-up will be for the first, 500,000 t/a phase. The plant will also produce 25 t/a of gold, 250 t/a of silver, and 1.5 million t/a of sulphuric acid and 250,000 t/a of phosphoric acid as by-products. India currently imports roughly two million t/a of sulphuric acid since the closure of the Vedanta smelter in Tamil Nadu.
We profile leading European NPK fertilizer producers. Major ownership changes have taken place within the EU during the last three years. Europe’s NPK producers have also needed to adjust their raw material sourcing in response to the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
Leading companies such as Ballestra, Buss ChemTech, Elessent Clean Technologies (MECS) and Prayon Technologies are working together to solve the numerous production challenges facing the operators of integrated phosphate fertilizer production plants.
In this review article, Hatch’s Jayden Ladebruk, Lyndsay Tran, Amelia Parrenin, and Edward DeRose outline the wide range of phosphoric acid production technologies, and discuss how industry challenges are influencing the choice of phosphoric acid process.
Metso is launching an advanced sustainable battery black mass recycling process as part of its battery minerals technology offering, which covers concentration and hydrometallurgical processing as well as related services. Demand for battery minerals is increasing sharply with the ongoing transition to clean energy sources. An electric car battery weighs approximately 200 kg. Recycling of black mass from batteries with Metso’s process can reduce up to 60% of embedded carbon compared to use of virgin materials and enables the treatment of mechanically separated and shredded batteries for recovering battery raw materials like nickel, cobalt, and lithium, as well as manganese and copper.