Award Data

Heat exchangers are widely used in refrigeration, air conditioning, automotive, aerospace, and other advanced energy systems (such as fuel systems). Fouling of heat exchangers is a serious and longstanding problem that can result in decreased heat transfer efficiency, higher resistance to fluid flow, increased energy consumption, decreased heat exchanger lifetime, and increased downtime necessary ...

Heat exchangers are widely used in power generation, chemical production, petrochemical refining, air conditioning, automotive, aerospace, and many emerging industries including hybrid vehicles, fuel cell systems, thermal solar, and biomass processing plants. Fouling of heat exchangers is a serious and longstanding problem causing significant energy losses (0.25% of Gross National Product), premat ...

In this proposed SBIR Phase I project, we will develop a proto

DOE-ITP Nanomanufacturing Initiative has given high priority to commercializing catalysts for chemical industries. There is ongoing need to develop low cost manufacturing infrastructure to support this objective. Using commercially available nanoparticles and related commercial materials, CMS will fabricate and demonstrate enhanced nanoparticle catalysis. Since all components are commercial scale- ...

This project will develop a unique membrane reactor system for the production of tetrahydrofuran. In 2004 about 200 million kg of tetrahydrofuran were produced. The most widely used industrial manufacturing process for this chemical involves the acid-catalyzed dehydration of 1,4-butanediol. In many applications tetrahydrofuran is used as a solvent, but is sought primarily as a precursor to polyte ...

The conventional process for making dry tetrahydrofuran is very energy intensive because of the need for azeotropic distillation. Substituting distillation by membrane drying can reduce the energy consumption for heating by a factor of 50. A membrane based process for purifying tetrahydrofuran with 98% less energy consumption than with a conventional azeotropic distillation process has been demons ...

Distillation is a very valuable chemical engineering unit operation but is energy intensive and capital intensive. This is especially true for removing water from organic and inorganic acids where components either form azeotropes or have small relative volatility differences. With a hybrid robust membrane process we can eliminate azeotropes and process pinch points. By using chemically and therm ...

There continues to be a need for production of fuel-grade ethanol from renewable sources. Ethanol from agricultural sources has many advantages including development of fuel independence. While there continues to be a significant need for ethanol, the cost of agricultural based ethanol is quite severe although existing and new legislation provides significant incentives for its use. This program ...

Bio-oil is a liquid fuel made from biomass such as wood chips and low grade wood byproducts by fast pyrolysis process. Presence of carboxylic acids in raw-bio-oil makes the bio-oil very acidic and corrosive. Raw bio-oil has low heating value primarily because of its high water content (up to 35 %). Oligomerization aldehydes and other compounds with an unsaturated carbon bond in raw bio-oil resu ...

In crude oil refining, asphaltenes are removed from heavy oil fractions to upgrade the quality of oil by solvent-deasphalting process. Solvents used in the solvent deasphalting process are recovered by either flash evaporation or super critical extraction. These conventional solvent recovery processes are highly energy intensive because of the phase change involved in the separation process. The c ...