Mitsubishi Chemical : and Mitsui Zosen Machinery & Service to Form Tie-up to Produce and Sell Zeolite Membranes

(4 Traders/Mitsubishi Chemical) Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding Co., Ltd. Mitsui Zosen Machinery & Service, Inc.

Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation (MCC; Head office: Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo; President: Hiroaki Ishizuka) and Mitsui Zosen Machinery & Service, Inc. (MZM; Head office: Chuo-ku, Tokyo; President: Masao Morita), a subsidiary of Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding Co., Ltd. (Head office: Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo; President: Takao Tanaka) have agreed to form a business tie-up to produce and sell zeolite membranes.

With the goal of entering new markets and expanding sales, MCC will purchase MZM's entire output of zeolite membranes and hold the sole sales rights in the U.S. and other global markets. Their agreement also provides proposals for new dehydration processes that will draw upon both companies' technologies.

Bioethanol, which is made mostly from corn and sugar cane, has come into widespread use as a fuel all over the world, especially in the U.S. and Brazil, in step with efforts to reduce CO2 emissions and promote the carbon neutral movement. In particular, the U.S. now has more than 210 bioethanol plants in operation, backed by increasing demand as a gasoline additive. US Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA)mandates doubling of current renewable fuels production by 2022.

In bioethanol refining and water removal processes, the pressure swing adsorption (PSA) dehydration process is used following the distillation process. The PSA process uses pellet-form general-purpose zeolite to remove water. Many plants adopted the PSA process more than 10 years ago, and will need bed refurbishment in next several years.

In addition, US EPA is aggressively encouraging ethanol producers to make production process more energy efficient and requires that ethanol derived from corn starch must meet a 20% lifecycle GHG reduction threshold. To meet that requirement many producers have started installing energy-saving equipment and processes as they gear up for production increase, that will require Zebrex or similar energy efficient technologies.

MZM has produced and marketed A-type zeolite membranes since 1998, and its products have been adopted in over 70 plants. For A-type zeolite membrane's strong dehydration performance, it has been adopted in industrial alcohol solvent collection systems and bioethanol water-removal processes. MCC successfully developed its unique CHA-type zeolite membranes, which have superior resistance to water and acid. It has been adopted in the solvent collection system developed by Mitsubishi Chemical Engineering Corporation (MEC, Head office: Chuo-ku, Tokyo; President: Ryuji Fukumura) and in Japanese sake concentration, which requires both water resistance and acid resistance.

MCC and MZM have already started joint marketing of a dehydration system using ZEBREXTM zeolite membranes in combination with A-type zeolite membranes and MCC-developed CHA-type zeolite membranes for bioethanol production processes in the U.S., along with Taiyo Nippon Sanso Corporation (TNSC; Head office: Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo; President: Yujiro Ichihara). The new business tie-up will help MCC and MZM further expand the zeolite business by taking advantage of MCC's zeolite development technology, the Mitsubishi Chemical Holdings Group's marketing capabilities, and MZM's A-type zeolite production technology and the product recognition.

MCC will develop proposals for customers to optimize their energy-saving processes and increase production by combining MZM's A-type zeolite membranes and MCC's CHA-type zeolite membranes.

PSA dehydration process, which is currently adopted in many bioethanol plants, uses pellet-form general-purpose zeolite to absorb water. PSA's zeolite beds use a absorption-desorption cycle every several minutes and must recycle about 20% of the refined bioethanol. Its vapor phase operation and continual recycling make the process very energy intensive.

The ZEBREXTM dehydration system combines CHA-type zeolite membranes, which have high separation performance with high water content, and A-type zeolite membranes, which are highly effective in final dehydration. This zeolite membrane system does not require recycling, so ethanol producers can reduce energy costs and increase production up to 15% by replacing the PSA process with the ZEBREXTM dehydration system or by adding ZEBREXTM dehydration system to their current process. READ MORE