Evonik has reached a settlement with the US EPA for exceeding permitted emission limits of ethylene oxide and ethylene glycol at its speciality surfactants facility in Reserve, Louisiana. Both are regulated as hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) under the Clean Air Act.

This followed an inspection on 18 April 2033 and an information request on 27 September, which concluded that emissions had exceeded the permitted levels. Evonik shut down the operations from 18 November until 3 February 2023, when it installed a temporary flare that can remove 98% or more of HAP emissions.

Merck KGaA has reached an agreement with the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to support a €300 million investment to expand its semiconductor manufacturing site in Hometown (pictured) by further develop the world's largest integrated speciality gases facility. About 68 new jobs will be created.

This is part of the Electronics business sector’s Level Up growth programme, which envisages spending over €3 billion in innovation and capacity expansion projects in the US, Germany and Asia by the end of 2025. Other investments to date and ongoing include:

CDMO supply chains “are potentially the biggest single risk to product resilience, yet they remain an area often overlooked by drug sponsors in partnering criteria”, said Bikash Chatterjee, CEO of Pharmatech Associates during a panel entitled ‘Redesigning the Supply Chain – The Road to Increased Resilience’. This was held as part of the online element of CPHI North America.

Evonik has agreed to sell its site at Niederkassel-Lülsdorf, Germany, and the associated cyanuric chloride business at Wesseling to International Chemical Investors Group (ICIG). Terms were not disclosed and the deal is scheduled to close in mid-2023, subject to regulatory clearance and approval by the competent Evonik committees. The businesses being divested had sales of around €260 million in 2022.

WuXi STA has added two 2,000 L reactors and a large-scale continuous purification system for peptide manufacturing at its Changzhou campus, bringing the total reactor volume for solid-phase peptide synthesis to over 10,000 L. It has also added a new system that features 300-DAC twin columns for continuous purification of kilogram-scale peptides and oligonucleotides, with faster turnaround times and lower solvent consumption.

Solvay has agreed a multi-year strategic collaboration with US firm Ginkgo Bioworks, which was formerly Zymergen. Under this, Solvay said, they will join forces “to unlock the power of synthetic biology as an enabler of more sustainable chemicals and materials, contributing to the transition towards more environmentally friendly solutions”.

Japanese firm Harima has built its first myrcene facility at its site in Kakogawa. Myrcene is obtained from pinene, a natural substance extracted from pine trees, and used in aroma oils and fragrances. The facility will mainly use energy self-generated from renewable energy sources and carbon-neutral fuel.