IChemE names SE Asia Awards 2016 finalists

AROUND 70 finalists have been announced for the IChemE Singapore Awards 2016 and the IChemE Malaysia Awards 2016, with both ceremonies taking place in South East Asia in October.

Both ceremonies will celebrate excellence, innovation and achievement in the chemical, process and biochemical industries.

The Singapore Awards, which will take place at the Shangri-La Hotel on 21 October, has named nearly 40 finalists for seven award categories including: energy, sustainable technology, and training and development.

Contenders include Glaxo Wellcome Manufacturing, PacificLight Power, Shell Chemicals Seraya, Senscient, Croda, and The Metabolic Engineering Research Laboratory (MERL).

The Awards, sponsored by ExxonMobil, GSK, MMI Engineering and Shell, also feature Singapore’s higher education institutes including: the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, Nanyang Technological University, and Ngee Ann Polytechnic. The National University of Singapore (NUS) returns to the 2016 shortlist after winning three awards at the 2015 ceremony.

Two new awards have been introduced this year, the Energy Award, and the Young Chemical Engineer in Industry Award – with young chemical engineers from Proctor & Gamble, Petroleum Conservation Research Association and Croda in the running.

Bakhtiar Talhah, IChemE’s director for South East Asia, said: “I would like to thank everyone who submitted their projects. The quality of entries was outstanding this year, and the judges had a difficult task of narrowing them down to these finalists. IChemE strongly believes in recognising achievement, and it is with help from our fantastic sponsors that we can hold this event year-on-year.”

The Malaysia Awards, sponsored by MMI Engineering and Schaefer Kalk, take place a few days later on 24 October at Le Meridien, Kuala Lumpur. The judges named over 30 finalists for eight categories including: palm oil industry, process safety and the chemical engineering industry project of the year.

Over 100 hopefuls applied for this year’s ceremony and some of the finalists include: Asean Bintulu Fertilizer, Desmett Ballestra, DNV, FGV Applied Technologies, and Green Plant Organic Fertilizer.

Malaysian oil giant Petronas also features this year, after scooping three trophies at last year’s ceremony. The company also boasts three nominations for the new individual categories; the Young Chemical Engineer in Industry and the Young Chemical Engineer in Research awards. Other nominees for these categories include an industrialist from Sarawak Shell and students from the University of Nottingham, Monash University Malaysia, and Petronas Research.

“In the ten years that IChemE has had a presence in Malaysia, we have given chemical engineers in this country a voice, and a platform, to set global standards for the profession. Almost 18% of IChemE’s membership is located in South East Asia, and this has been reflected by the volume of high quality entries we received this year,” Talhah commented on the Malaysian awards.

The winners at both ceremonies will be automatically shortlisted for the IChemE Global Awards, to be held in Manchester, UK on 3 November. They will be in contention for the overall Award for Outstanding Achievement in Chemical and Process Engineering, which is selected from all entries received worldwide.

Full list of the Singapore awards nominations.

Full list of the Malaysia awards nominations.