Emisiones atmosféricas

Optimization of boiler efficiency is a long-established means of reducing natural gas use. At our Maua, Brazil, carbon black manufacturing facility, a multifunctional team conducted a detailed review of the boiler operation at the site in an effort to recover more waste heat, improve the operating efficiency of the boiler and reduce NO_X emissions. The team identified several key areas that needed to be addressed, including using 100% of the by-product gas (tailgas) from the carbon black process, reducing excess air flow to the unit and increasing the temperature in the boiler to achieve higher NO_X removal rates from the selective noncatalytic reactor. By making these improvements, the team was able to retrofit the process such that 100% of the tailgas generated from the carbon black manufacturing process could be utilized by the incinerator.

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In 2017, we completed two key projects in air containment reduction. At our Pampa, Texas, USA, facility, we finalized the installation of the NO_X control system. The new system, designed and installed over the past three years, uses a two-stage process to remove nearly 90% of NO_X emissions or approximately 1,400 MT per year. At our Tianjin, China, carbon black facility, we completed the first phase of our NO_X control system, also achieving nearly 90% removal of NO_X from that operating unit. Both projects are contributing significantly to our NO_X goal, and we continue to make progress at other facilities to introduce similar technologies.

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In 2017, our Tianjin, China, carbon black facility completed an upgrade of its waste heat recovery system, which enabled us to provide nearly 45 MT of steam per hour to our neighbor in the Tianjin Bin-hai New Area. By using steam generated from our waste heat, our neighbor eliminated their annual use of 45,000 MT of coal, resulting in significant benefits to air quality by reducing annual emissions of NO_X by 50 MT, SO₂ by 280 MT, and eliminating nearly 112,000 MT of CO₂. The project received significant recognition from the local government in support of China’s overall effort to reduce emissions and improve air quality.

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At many of our facilities over the past several years, we have invested heavily in equipment and process improvements to generate electricity from steam or to enable the use of our process off-gas as a substitute for natural gas. While we use much of this energy ourselves, we are often able to sell any excess energy to our neighbors and partners as well, which reduces their use of fossil fuels. In 2017, the energy we sold offset more than 500,000 MT of CO₂e from the environment, equivalent to the annual Scope 1 and Scope 2 GHG emissions of two typical carbon black manufacturing facilities. These efforts will continue in the future, with the completion of the energy recovery facility currently under construction at our Franklin, Louisiana, USA, carbon black facility.

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