R&D experience: The DCCD^TM innovative Technology

As part of the selection of innovative sustainable projects, the Group promoted the DCCD^TM (Dual Column Cryogenic Distillation) technology, a process for the separation of the acid components contained in natural gas streams.
Many natural gas fields contain a significant amount of CO2: to make the gas suitable for commercialization and usage, this compound has to be removed. The DCCD^TM technology, jointly developed by Tecnimont and the Milan Polytechnic, permits the development of the natural gas fields containing a significant amount of CO2, in a more economical and sustainable way. The intrinsic characteristics of the DCCD^TM technology would considerably reduce natural gas production costs and CO2 re-injection costs, thus developing these challenging fields while limiting greenhouse gas emissions.  
The main R&D activities focused on the design and construction of a laboratory scale pilot plant. The execution experimental campaigns aimed at validating the technology, the development of a technology information package for an industrial plant, and on the search for an Industrial Partner with whom to collaborate for the scale-up to an industrial size pilot plant, thus allowing the start-up of licensing activities.