'Seven chemical separations to change the world'

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Contact

John Toon, jtoon@gatech.edu

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Sholl, Lively featured in Horizons

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  • David Sholl and Ryan Lively David Sholl and Ryan Lively
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Thermally-based industrial chemical separation processes such as distillation now account for 10 to 15 percent of the world’s annual energy use. Slaking the global thirst for energy could therefore get a substantial boost from improved technologies for producing fuels, plastics, food and other products with reduced inputs of energy.

In a comment article published April 26 in the journal Nature, two researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology suggest seven energy-intensive separation processes they believe should be the top targets for research into low-energy purification technologies. Beyond cutting energy use, improved techniques for separating chemicals from mixtures would also reduce pollution, cut carbon dioxide emissions – and open up new ways to obtain critical resources the world needs.

Technologies applicable to those separation processes are at varying stages of development, the authors note. These alternative processes are now under-developed or expensive to scale up, and making them feasible for large-scale use could require a significant investment in research and development.

Read the entire article here.

Additional Information

Groups

Renewable Bioproducts Institute (RBI)

Categories
Institute and Campus, Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Student and Faculty, Energy, Engineering, Research
Related Core Research Areas
Bioengineering and Bioscience, Energy and Sustainable Infrastructure, Renewable Bioproducts
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Status
  • Created By: Kelly Smith
  • Workflow Status: Published
  • Created On: Jun 27, 2016 - 8:52am
  • Last Updated: Oct 7, 2016 - 11:22pm