GOVERNMENT
Energy touts benefits of industry partnerships Ever since the November elections, House Republicans have repeatedly an nounced plans to eliminate the Depart ment of Energy. And House Science Committee chairman Robert S. Walker (R-Pa.) is particularly eager to phase out what he calls "corporate welfare," pro grams in which government and indus try share technology research and devel opment costs. Against this background, DOE's Of fice of Industrial Technology (OIT) held its first Industrial Energy Efficien cy Symposium & Exposition earlier this month. The main purpose of the meet ing was to demonstrate the success of the partnerships OIT has established with industry and to inform businesses how they can form partnerships. An other aim was to increase the use of ex isting energy-efficient equipment. In 1976, the ΟΓΓ program was estab lished to help reduce energy use and waste in the materials and process in dustries. ΟΓΓ primarily helps industries explore technological innovations that are longer term and higher risk than an industry would undertake on its own. It has focused on seven sectors: chemicals, petroleum refining, pulp and paper, steel, glass, aluminum, and metal cast ing. By the end of 1994, ΟΓΓ had helped commercialize more than 65 technolo gies that have saved these seven sectors $2.4 billion in cumulative energy costs. Energy Secretary Hazel R. O'Leary, who gave the keynote speech at the ΟΓΓ symposium, said: "What we are doing to work with industry is not corporate welfare. It is the nation's well-being. We primarily focus on improving the pro cesses, not the products, in the indus tries, and by improving processes, we benefit the entire industry." O'Leary also noted that reducing waste flows and energy use in these in dustries can have a large return, be cause they produce about 95% of the nation's manufacturing wastes and use the bulk of the energy required in U.S. manufacturing. During the meeting, each of the sev en industry sectors that are being helped by ΟΓΓ described its vision of the future and technologies being de veloped in partnership with DOE to help achieve that vision's goals. 22
MAY 22,1995 C&EN
Chemical industry representatives re ported on the progress they have made in developing their own vision for the future. This project, which is being led by the American Chemical Society, the Chemical Manufacturers Association, and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, will publish in the fall a vi sion document of about 50 pages identi fying the future goals and technology needs of the industry. C. Thomas Sciance, recently retired di rector of environmental technology part nerships at DuPont, said one of the project's aims is to enable the chemical industry to become even more competi tive in the international marketplace than it is now. Another goal is sustain able development. In the future, he pre dicts, prevention of waste will be the major focus of environmental activity, genetic manipulation will be accepted, and bioprocessing will represent an im portant area of new process investment. Josephine S. Cooper, vice president of environment and regulatory affairs for the American Forest & Paper Prod ucts Association, said her industry has mapped out its future directions in a document that outlines its vision. The plan focuses on sustainable forests, en vironmental improvement, improved energy efficiency, and recycling and re covery of paper chemicals. She regards collaborative projects with ΟΓΓ as key to achieving this vision. And Don M. Ings, president and chief operating officer of Solar Turbines, San Diego, said that SoLoNOx gas turbines, one of his company's major products,
O'Leary: focusing on processes
would not exist without partnerships with ΟΓΓ. This is an advanced turbine system that produces low emissions of ni trogen oxides (NOx), carbon monoxide, and unburned hydrocarbons without us ing selective catalytic reduction units to clean up the exhaust stream and without injecting steam or water into the tuibine combustor to control NOx emissions. One chemically related ΟΓΓ project featured at the conference involves com pany partnerships with five DOE labs to develop methods of producing industri al feedstocks from agricultural products and wood waste. For example, a small business, Redmond, Wash.-based Inter national Polyol Chemicals, in conjunc tion with Pacific Northwest Laboratory, is developing a technology to convert sorbitol—made from glucose by hydro génation—to specific polyols such as ethylene glycol, propylene glycol, glycerol, and butanediols. Also, Argonne National Laboratory and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory are collaborating with General Electric to use food and agricultural waste as feedstock to produce intermediates for biodegradable plastics. The idea is to use biocatalysts and bioprocessing to produce polymers from agricultural products and to use the polymers to make advanced thermoplastics, said Terry Leib of GE. The advantages of such processes are that they would reduce petrochemical use, reduce hazardous waste, and increase the use of farm products, according to Leib. Partnerships are necessary for this research because they are the only way to supply sufficient funding and technical expertise in the many disciplines required, he explained. James F. Owens, chief financial officer of Caterpillar, Peoria, Π1., agreed. "Be cause research-oriented technology in vestments are difficult for individual companies to justify," partial govern ment funding and help with such proj ects is important, he said. Rep. Vernon J. Ehlers (R-Mich.), who has a Ph.D. degree in nuclear physics, said at the meeting that it is essential for DOE to continue to support basic in dustrial research. "Conservatives think energy efficiency is some sort of fuzzyheaded liberal approach, but this is a dollars-and-cents issue," he said. "If en ergy costs are 10% of the operational costs, and you save 10% of the energy, you increase profits," he explained. Bette Hileman
