With the ASCO dry ice pellet filling unit, freshly produced dry ice pellets can be filled directly into containers or boxes and dosed by weight. This is particularly useful when cold chains must not be interrupted and goods have to be shipped under freezing conditions. For filling the dry ice pellets, the unit provides individually storable presets that define the preliminary and main dry ice filling quantity.

Together with HTC Extraction Systems, ASCO delivered a unit for recovering carbon dioxide (CO₂) to an Alberta-based applied research organization. It extracts six metric tons of CO₂ per day from the flue gas of a natural gas-fired power plant. It is the world’s first CO₂ recovery plant certified according to ISO 14034 ETV. The certification was carried out by the independent consulting firm 350Solutions.

As a refrigerant for passenger car air conditioners, carbon dioxide (CO2) is a climate-friendly alternative to the tetrafluoroethane that was used in the past. With its cylinder gases segment, Messer in Canada is the country’s key supplier of CO2 in the refrigerant quality required for this application.

At its site in southwestern France, a company specialized in the production of baby food uses CO₂ and the Neutrabox injection system from Messer to neutralize alkaline wastewater. This solution is more eco-friendly, more economical and safer than using mineral acids. It also controls pH more effectively and precisely.

At FKM Sintertechnik in Biedenkopf, Messer installed new liquid nitrogen tanks and an EcoVap unit to make use of cooling energy. The gas is used for inertization in various sub-processes. The EcoVap unit takes the cold released by the liquefied gas in a cooling plant and transfers it to the circulating coolant. This enables FKM to save energy, cut costs and reduce the size of its ecological footprint. The company also uses shielding and process gases from Messer.

In late summer 2021, Messer supplied hydrogen for the trial operation of a fuel cell-powered public bus in the Waldshut-Tiengen district. The four-week test phase successfully investigated the practical feasibility of the vehicle. The bus carried passengers on established routes in normal operation. One fill-up with 38 kilograms held enough fuel for up to 400 kilometers, which more than sufficed for the distance typically traveled over the course of a day, about 300 kilometers.

Toyota Tsusho and Messer presented the “one-stop shop” in Höchst. This joint concept for fuel cell-powered buses offers all the associated services from a single source – including the necessary hydrogen infrastructure. Patricia Vasconcelos, Managing Director of the Portuguese bus manufacturer CaetanoBus, used the workshop to give a live demonstration of her company’s fuel cell-powered bus. The event was hosted by industrial services specialist Infraserv and organized by LEA LandesEnergieAgentur Hessen.

A few years from now, the ITER nuclear fusion reactor currently under construction in Cadarache, France, will begin fusing hydrogen isotopes. In order to be able to stop the reaction, if necessary, the fusion laboratory of the Energy Research Center in Budapest is developing a secure shutdown mechanism based on the introduction of -260°C hydrogen ice. It is fired at high speed into the target area, where it lowers the temperature and therefore the energy level of the plasma. The fusion laboratory’s gas supply system, which operates at a pressure of 300 bar, was installed by Messer. Messer also supplies the project with high-purity gases such as hydrogen, helium, argon, neon and nitrogen.

The Swiss company Flisom specializes in the production of ultralight and flexible solar films. At its film production operation in Hungary, Flisom uses argon, helium and nitrogen from Messer. Flisom’s production technology makes it possible to minimize material and energy requirements for a product with both low levelized cost of electricity (LCoE) and high energy output.

Mlekovita Dairy in Baranów has been treating its sewage sludge with oxygen from Messer since 2016 because the addition of oxygen increases the plant’s efficiency. Otherwise, the company would have had to expand its wastewater treatment plant. The gas also helps reduce equipment requirements and the use of chemicals. In a test series, Messer had previously determined the optimal process conditions. The dairy was able to significantly reduce the quantity of wastewater it produces. 

Messer installed an oxygen production unit in Hrastnik for the glass manufacturer Steklarna Hrastnik. The Slovenian company has been using oxygen to melt glass for more than 50 years now. Previously, the gas has been delivered in tank cars. The new on-site unit significantly reduces the cost and CO₂ emissions associated with transport while raising supply reliability at the same time. The use of oxygen increases combustion efficiency in the melting furnace, thereby also lowering CO₂ emissions.

To recycle refrigerators and freezers, Industrias López Soriano (ILSSA) buys liquid nitrogen from Messer. A plant in Zaragoza uses the cryogenic gas to separate out the environmentally harmful refrigerants in a two-step process. ILSSA has more than five recycling plants in the autonomous region of Aragon, which receive waste materials and waste products from all over Spain. Using state-of-the-art technology, ILSSA extracts an extremely wide range of materials from the waste and returns them to the industrial production chain as raw materials.

The City of Tarragona wants to convert its fleet of buses to emission-free vehicles. For the test drive with a hydrogen-powered bus, Messer delivered the gas from a fuel pump installed at the company’s site in Vilaseca. Along with the municipal authorities of Tarragona, Toyota and CaetanoBus were also involved in the organization of the test run. Together with Messer, they offer a comprehensive solution for the operation of hydrogen-powered bus fleets. 

Ozone is extremely reactive and has potentially beneficial applications, such as converting noxious drug residues into harmless substances. And that is why ozone is playing an increasingly important role in sewage treatment. The wastewater treatment plant in Reinach in northern Switzerland adds an average of two to three grams of ozone per cubic meter of wastewater. The process is easy to handle, not labor-intensive, and considerably less expensive than alternative methods. The ozone is produced on site using oxygen from Messer.

At a car manufacturing plant in Greer, South Carolina, Messer installed a redundant hydrogen supply system with high-capacity pumps and a 90,000-liter liquefied hydrogen tank. Messer has already been developing, installing, operating and maintaining the hydrogen supply and refueling infrastructure for the manufacturing plant since 2010. It supplies more than 700 forklifts and material handling vehicles today – one of the largest fleets of this type in the USA. 

When delivering frozen food to end customers in Greater Paris, the retail chain Casino Group’s subsidiary O’logistique relies on SnowDrop units from Messer and MiniCryo boxes from Olivo Cold Logistics. Dry ice snow securely stored in the lid keeps the contents of the delivery boxes reliably cooled for up to 18 hours. A Messer-patented SnowDrop machine produces fresh dry ice snow and automatically feeds it into the lids.

When pressing sunflower oil, only about 40 percent of the seed weight is used for food. Until recently, the remaining components, which contain valuable fibers and proteins, were processed into animal feed or even discarded. The German company Sunbloom has developed a process that now makes it possible to recover proteins from sunflower seeds. Messer supplies Sunbloom with high-purity test gases used in laboratory analyses.

The food manufacturer New Roots in Oberdiessbach, Switzerland, has been using plant-based materials to produce alternatives to soft cheese, cream cheese, cheese spread, crème fraîche, fondue and yogurt for the past six years. The protective gas Gourmet N70 is used to package the various cheese spreads. It extends product shelf life, thereby also preventing food waste.

On the virtual trade fair stand at the International Production & Processing Expo 2021 Marketplace (IPPE), Messer Americas showed the new Wave Impingement Freezer as well as the Bottom Injection Chilling System for mixing proteins and ingredients in the food industry.  Converting to cooling and freezing by means of liquid nitrogen can yield large efficiency gains. In connection with this, Messer offers virtual engineering and consulting services to help customers optimize processes and develop application-specific solutions.