Bioenergy

Industrial Gases and Technical Expertise from a Global Leader

Read more about the benefits and safety improvements of using nitrogen to blanket your process or material.

Nitrogen is an inert, nonflammable gas that can be used to replace air in storage tanks and piping used for flammable or potentially self-igniting biomass or other waste materials. Nitrogen supply is also an excellent way to push material into pyrolysis processes that cannot be exposed to oxygen.

Inerting/blanketing with a nitrogen atmosphere reduces the risk of fire and explosions and often leads to a decrease in insurance premiums. Also, because moist air is kept out, equipment corrosion or product oxidation is minimized. Use of nitrogen in FAME biodiesel projects is very common. Our engineers can help you specify the optimal nitrogen inerting/blanketing system to meet your needs.

Nitrogen: A Security Blanket for the Chemical Industry

Hydrogenation of fats and oils

Renewable diesel fuels are produced by hydrogenating bio-oils (including vegetable oils, animal fats, algae oils, and pyrolysis oils) into paraffinic hydrocarbons. Existing petroleum refineries may be co-processing or blending the renewable fuels with petroleum fuels during the hydrotreating process to create a renewable diesel blend. Stand-alone facilities can produce 100% renewable diesel to be used directly or for blending with petroleum diesel in order to create a renewable diesel blend.

Air Products can provide hydrogen through a number of supply modes to meet your volume, pressure and composition requirements. In addition, we have advanced membrane technology for recovering hydrogen from biorefinery off-gases.

PRISM® Hydrogen Generation Systems

Cryogenic Hydrogen Compressor System

Fire suppression for biomass storage and systems

We can help you design fire prevention and suppression systems for biomass silos using our advanced computational fluid dynamics modeling and proprietary technologies. Drawing on our successful design of nitrogen inerting systems in the wood pellet and related industries, we aim to optimize silo design and improve fire safety.

Biomass Storage: Fire Suppression Using Nitrogen Inerting, Pellet Mill magazine

Bioenergy process testing

Air Products’ Hydrogen Reactions Lab is designed to create an opportunity for innovation and productivity in our customers' hydrogenation reactions. Let our engineers help you improve product quality and reduce production costs by identifying the optimum pressure, temperature and hydrogen-to-feed ratio for your specific feedstock and catalyst.

Hydrogen Recovery from Biorefinery Off-Gases

Membranes for hydrogen separation from biorefinery off-gases can have several advantages over other separation technologies such as lower energy consumption, and easier scale-up. Air Products PRISM® membranes enable economical recovery of hydrogen. They have small skid footprints and no moving parts, which minimizes maintenance costs. They are also easy to install and operate. Air Products has extensive experience in membrane systems including our PRISM® hydrogen membranes.

Hydrogen

Valued for its reactive and protective properties, and used by many industries such as electronics, foods, glass, chemicals, refining and more can benefit from its unique properties to improve quality, optimize performance and reduce costs.
Oxygen

In addition to its use as a respiratory gas for healthcare applications, its strong oxidizing properties benefit many industries by improving yields, optimizing performance, lowering costs and reducing carbon footprint compared to other fuels.
Nitrogen

Useful as a gas, for its inert properties, and as a liquid for cooling and freezing. Virtually any industry can benefit from its unique properties to improve yields, optimize performance and make operations safer.
Carbon Dioxide

Our experienced applications teams across the globe can use their industry and application knowledge to provide you with a compressed or liquid carbon dioxide supply and technology solution to meet your unique needs.
Bulk Supply

Delivered by truck and stored on your site either as a liquid in cryogenic tanks or as a gas in high-pressure tubes based on your volume, desired pressure, purity level, flow rate, and operating pattern.
On-site Gas Generation

On-site gas generation helps sustainability-minded customers lower their carbon footprint, boost energy efficiency, increase throughput, enhance end product quality, and improve environmental performance.
PRISM® Membranes

PRISM Membrane separators generate gas onsite for applications like nitrogen generation, air dehydration, hydrogen recovery, biogas upgrading, and the generation of oxygen enriched air.
APEX Temporary Emergency Gas Services

Short-term or emergency industrial gas supply for start-ups, peak demand periods, planned or unplanned maintenance activities, and plant or pipeline turnarounds.
Cryogenic Air Separation Plants

Air Products currently owns and operates over 300 air separation plants in over 40 countries worldwide, in all types of applications. In addition to our own plants, we have sold, designed and built over 1000 air separation plants globally.

Related Industries

Air Products offers thousands of products and services to a variety of different industries. This scope and experience has enabled us to develop a deeper understanding of the demands of these industries, and of your particular needs.

We have provided information most relevant to you within this industry section, but you may find information in other related industries of interest as well. The attached list is provided as a convenience for you or you can click on “Industries” in the top navigation for a full listing.

Expert solutions to help you succeed

Related Industries

Data Sheets

Articles & Whitepapers

Videos