Reliable partner Nuova Solmine

RELIABLE PARTNER

Italy-based Nuova Solmine SpA is a major producer of sulphuric acid and oleum in the Mediterranean basin. With roots going back to the early 1960s, the company is a well-established specialist in its sector. Romana Moares reports.

Sulphuric acid is the most used base chemical in the industrial world. A compound commonly used as the catalyser in chemical reactions such as alkylation, sulphonation, nitration and oil refining, sulphuric acid has many applications both in laboratories and in industries including fertiliser production, mineral treatment, chemical synthesis, oil refining, waste water treatment as well as in iron and steel production.

It is also used in the food industry, textiles, paper mills, detergents, car battery production, the pharmaceutical industry, in paints and pigments, pesticides, resins and silicone plastics, and in glassworks.

With two manufacturing plants in Italy – in Scarlino, Grosseto province and Serravalle Scrivia, Alessandria province - Nuova Solmine is the country’s largest producer of sulphuric acid, with around 670,000 tonnes produced a year. The company also produces around 110,000 tonnes of oleum a year; complementary products are demineralised water, steam, and electricity.

In addition to its own production, Nuova Solmine also buys sulphuric acid from both domestic and foreign producers as needed by its customers, with a total product availability of about one million tonnes per year. Two Italian facilities

The company’s main operational facility is the Scarlino plant, spread over some 140 hectares, with an annual capacity of approximately 600,000 tonnes. The plant is classified as a ‘basic inorganic chemistry’ industrial process and falls within the category of high-accident risk processing plants as it stocks fuming sulphuric acid – oleum that contains free SO3.

The other, smaller production plant is located in Serravalle Scrivia and produces approximately 75,000 tonnes of sulphuric acid and oleum per annum through the treatment of waste containing sulphur and by regenerating spent acid. Scrivia is the only plant in Italy to work on the heat treatment of liquid and solid waste containing sulphur. Spent sulphuric acid is also regenerated here.

As a result of its advanced technology and high calibre specialist personnel, the sulphuric acid made in Nuova Solmine is of high quality and purity, comparable to that produced directly from sulphur. Recovering waste that would otherwise be disposed of, the company at the same time contributes significantly to environmental protection. Nuova Solmine continuously improves its structures

and technology to achieve not only high efficiency but also the best environmental care.

By recovering the sulphur contained in liquid and solid industrial waste, often classified as dangerous, the company not only saves raw materials but by efficient waste treatment also prevents sulphur dioxide emissions, thus limiting any negative environmental impact.

The whole process is managed with the utmost care from receipt, unloading and stocking through to treatment and final recovery in the two incineration lines: a static furnace for liquid waste, and a rotating drum furnace principally used for solid waste.

Nuova Solmine plants work within a continuous production cycle, around the clock, 365 days a year, thereby guaranteeing that clients can deliver their waste products all year round. The ample stocking facilities available for various types of waste are an added advantage.

International player

Nuova Solmine’s key market is Italy, but a substantial amount of product is sold in export markets, particularly in the Mediterranean basin countries, including France, Spain, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Israel, Turkey and Greece.

In 2012, Solmine founded a subsidiary in Spain, its most important, and nearest, international market: Nuova Solmine Iberia, with its own storage for local distribution. The company also has customers in Portugal, and further afield in Central and South America, where sulphuric acid plays a major part in metal processing and fertiliser production.

Nuova Solmine is associated with leading international organisations in its sector. It is a full member of the European Sulphuric Acid Association, a division of the European Chemical Industry Council, bringing together European sulphuric acid producers, as well as the International Fertiliser Industry Association.

It also subscribes to the General Confederation of Italian Industry, the Italian Federation of the Chemical Industry, and the Italian Electrical Association. The company also actively participates in the Responsible Care Programme and SET (Emergency Transport Service).

In compliance with the European REACH regulation (CE 1907/2006), the company has provided for the registration of all the sulphuric acid and oleum it produces and imports, whether they are classified dangerous or not, for quantities higher than one tonne per year. n