The Hindu Business Line : Veecon ties up with Japanese company for nitrogen plants

Veecon-IPA Gastechnik Ltd, an Indo-German joint venture company, is bringing into India an improved version of nitrogen-producing plants, in collaboration with a Japanese company.

Several industries need nitrogen in their processes. For example, pharma companies need the inert gas for insulating some key processes from the atmosphere. These companies can either buy nitrogen gas in cylinders, or produce the gas on their own.

Veecon-IPA is one of the companies that supply plants that produce nitrogen (and, other gases). These plants separate nitrogen from the air by passing compressed air through a chamber containing a material called `carbon molecular sieves', which are produced from coal or coconut shells.

These carbon molecular sieves, or CMS, suck all the oxygen in the air, letting out only nitrogen.

Now, in collaboration with Kuraray Chemical of Japan, Veecon-IPA is bringing in nitrogen producing plants (called `pressure swing adsorption systems'), which contain a superior variety of CMS. This `new generation CMS' can adsorb more oxygen, making the nitrogen plants more efficient.

Veecon-IPA is a Rs 50-crore company based in New Delhi. It aims to capture a third of the Rs 150-crore market for nitrogen plants in two years.

At a press conference here on Wednesday, Mr Jaswant Kumar Srivastava, Managing Director, Veecon-IPA, said that there were two other methods of producing nitrogen — cryogenic process, and by passing air through a special membrane.

The first method is used by gas merchants who produce the gas and sell it in cylinders. The second is mainly used in crude oil production, where nitrogen of relatively low purity is pushed into the gas wells in order to force natural gas out of the wells. Veecon-IPA is into membrane technology as well, but not in cryogenics.

The company also makes plants for other gases — oxygen, hydrogen and carbon di-oxide, for which it has different technical collaborations, but roughly half of its sales comes from nitrogen plants.

At the press conference, Mr Katsu Takahashi, Manager - Overseas Development, Kuraray Chemicals, said that the company was open to setting up a CMS manufacturing plant in India, but was not anywhere close to making a decision on that.

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