Kyoto Protocol is having its effects in Europe: Messer has won two new orders for the construction of exhaust air purification plants. Using the cold from nitrogen, greenhouse gases are reduced.

With its new patented DuoCondex® process for exhaust air purification, the industrial gases specialist Messer has won orders in Slovakia and in France worth a total of 2 million euros. Using this process, compliance with the EU clean air limits, which is influenced by implementation of the Kyoto Agreement, is not only easily achieved in recycling processes and in the chemicals industry, but the values attained are often well below the limits.

Recycling refrigerators without polluting the environment

The process, developed by Messer, uses the extremely low temperature of liquid nitrogen to freeze and recover CFCs or solvents from exhaust gases. The Messer plant is to be integrated into a refrigerator recycling plant being constructed by the German company MeWa Recycling Maschinen und Anlagenbau GmbH, based in Gechingen (near Stuttgart). This plant will shortly be installed on the premises of the operating firm Elektro Recycling s.r.o. in Banská Bystrica in Slovakia.

In France, a DuoCondex plant will be used by Sanofi Aventis in Vitry near Paris for the recovery of dichloromethane. Nitrogen does not burn, so the gas – which is extracted from the atmosphere – simultaneously provides reliable protection from explosions and fires during the recycling.