Umicore's Sustainability and Financial Report
Glossary
The below definitions cover Umicore's main business & technical abbreviations
Catalysis Glossary
umicore
Automotive platform: A shared set of common design, engineering and production efforts as well as major components over a number of outwardly distinct models of vehicles
Catalysis/catalyst: Catalysis is a chemical process whereby one of the elements used in the reaction process, the catalyst, makes this chemical reaction possible, or speeds up this process.
China / Euro 7: Chinese / European air pollution emissions standard for light-duty and heavy-duty vehicles, imposing stringent norms in particular for gasoline vehicles and heavy-duty diesel.
Emission Control Catalyst: Emission control catalysts constitute an essential part of today's vehicles powered by internal combustion engines, mitigating the harmful effects of pollutants in
the exhaust such as carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, nitrogen oxides, and particulate matter. Emission control catalysts are made from Platinum Group Metals (Pd, Pt, Rh) which have
specific properties (pollutants attach to the metals). Emission control catalysts are highly customized and tailormade to the specific car/truck engine characteristics as well as the applicable
emission norms which can differ from one region to another. Umicore's Automotive Catalysts business unit produces catalysts for transportation, while the Stationary Catalysts activity
produces this for power plants, industry.
Emission norms: Emission standards are the legal requirements governing air pollutants released into the atmosphere. Emission standards set quantitative limits on the permissible amount
of specific air pollutants that may be released from specific sources over specific timeframes. Many emissions standards focus on regulating pollutants released by automobiles and other
powered vehicles. Others regulate emissions from industry, power plants, small equipment such as lawn mowers and diesel generators, and other sources of air pollution. There are largely
three main sets of standards: United States, Japanese, and European, with various markets mostly using these as their base. India, China, and other newer markets have also begun
enforcing vehicle emissions standards (derived from the European requirements) as growing vehicle fleets have given rise to severe air quality problems there, too.
Fuel cell catalysts (FCC): a fuel cell is an electrochemical cell that converts the chemical energy of a fuel (hydrogen) and an oxidizing agent (oxygen) into electricity. Fuel cells can produce
electricity continuously for as long as fuel and oxygen are supplied. A hydrogen fuel cell catalyst eases the reaction of oxygen and hydrogen. These catalysts are made with platinum.
Umicore's Fuel Cell activity produces PEM fuel cell catalysts and it's a market leader in the transportation.
Gasoline Particulate Filters (GPF): Gasoline particulate filters are used to remove particulate matter from the exhaust gas from a gasoline direct injection (GDI) engine. The implementation
of Euro 6 and China 6 emission norms in 2018 / 2019 resulted in the introduction of GPF's in most gasoline direct injection engines in these regions. Heavy duty diesel (HDD): Large diesel
vehicles - either on-road, such as trucks and buses, or non-road such as heavy plant and mining equipment or locomotives and agricultural equipment.
Heavy duty vehicle (HDV): Primarily heavy-weight trucks (but also off-road heavy transportation). Mostly using diesel (heavy-duty diesel - HDD) but growing use of hydrogen.
Light duty vehicle (LDV): Primarily passenger cars - using diesel, gasoline or other fuel.
Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM): In the automotive industry, refers to car manufacturers.
Platinum-group metals (PGMs): The six platinum-group metals are ruthenium, rhodium, palladium, osmium, iridium, and platinum. In particular, palladium, platinum and rhodium are key
components of emission control catalysts.
PEM FCC: Proton-Exchange-Membrane fuel cell catalysts are a type of fuel cells (see fuel cell catalyst)
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