Meeting rising energy requirements and protecting the environment are among the most important applications of catalyst technology. Broadly speaking, a catalyst is a substance that increases the rate of a chemical reaction by reducing the required activation energy, but is left unchanged by the reaction. A catalyst reacts with a reactant, forming chemical intermediates that are able to react more readily with each other or with another reactant, to form the desired end product. During the reaction between the chemical intermediates and the reactants, the catalyst is regenerated.
According to a recently updated report from Business Communications Company, Inc, RC-166R Catalysts for Environmental and Energy Applications, the global market for energy and environmental catalysts was worth an estimated $6.2 billion in 2002 and $6.4 billion in 2003. The market is projected to grow to over $7.1 billion in 2004 and almost $13.0 billion in 2009, an average annual growth rate (AAGR) of 12.8% from 2004 through 2009.
The petroleum industry is the largest single user of catalysts, especially in producing refined products such as gasoline and diesel fuel. Catalysts also contribute to increasing the supply of petroleum, by making it commercially possible to produce oil from sources once regarded as uneconomical such as tar sands and heavy oil deposits. They are also being used to produce increasing quantities of synthetic oil and gas from coal and oil shale. Also, catalysts are in the forefront of technologies being developed to replace conventional fossil fuels.
The refinery industry accounted for almost 90% of the energy catalyst market, but is projected to lose market share from 2004 through 2009 as other energy applications, particularly synfuels and biofuels, consume increasing amounts of catalysts. However, refining will still account for some 80% of the energy catalyst market in 2009.
Catalysts are indispensable to many types of environmental remediation, from vehicle emissions control systems to industrial effluent and municipal waste treatment. Catalysts also contribute indirectly to reducing pollution and other adverse environmental impacts, e.g., through cleaner-burning fuels and the production of products such as refrigerants that pollute less than the substances they replace.
Mobile source air pollution remediation applications, particularly vehicle catalytic converters, accounted for over 36% of the environmental catalyst market in 2003, followed by stationary source air pollution applications (e.g., power plant emissions controls) with 33% of the market. The market for catalysts used in stationary source applications is projected to grow rapidly, due to new environmental legislation, so that by 2009 stationary source applications are projected to have a 65% share of the environmental catalyst market.
