Technical & Practical
Millichannel Reactors: A Practical Middle Ground for Production
The desire to move from batch to continuous processes for the production of high-value organic molecules has become more widespread in recent years as evidenced by the increasing number of related studies published in the literature. The benefits of continuous…
Maximizing Heat-Transfer Fluid Longevity
Faced with increased workloads and time and budget constraints that often restrict external training support, many chemical process operators are forced to get the most out of their heat transfer system with less help. This article offers recommendations for how…
Creating Installed Gain Graphs for Control Valves
Installed gain graphs can help improve the selection of control valves for chemical processing. The graphs are plotted to analyze together control-valve flow characteristics and process-system flow characteristics, and better illustrate the relationship between a control valve and the system.…
Smooth Your Retrieval of Plant-Design Data
Most chemical engineers involved with operating large chemical process facilities have encountered the following challenge: Several large engineering contractors built the facility in multiple phases, using different computer-software models. Retrieving drawings or data in both digital and non-digital form in…
A Primer on Spray Drying
An understanding of the basic information presented here will help you produce powdered products with desired characteristics, while operating the drying plant safely and with minimum energy This photo shows a spray dryer with a heat recuperator. The plant…
De-emphasize Capital Costs For Pipe Size Selection
Piping represents a major cost for projects in the chemical process industries (CPI). Larger pipe diameters increase upfront capital costs for a project, but the lower pressure drops afforded by large pipes mean less power is required to move the…
Making the Leap from R&D to Manufacturing
The success of industrial R&D activities has a direct impact on a company’s long-term commercial profitability. Today, a variety of market forces, including the drive for growth, the search for new ideas and innovative products, and the increasingly competitive pressures…
Direct-Fired Heaters: Evaluate Thermal Performance And the Effects of Fouling
Direct-fired heaters find wide application throughout the chemical process industries (CPI) and are common in petroleum refineries, where they are used to preheat petroleum or petroleum-derived feedstocks in advance of downstream process operations. Since excessive internal tube fouling occurs above…
Aboveground and Underground Storage Tanks
The ultimate objective of storing liquid, fluid and gaseous products, which may be corrosive, flammable or unstable, is to store material in an environmentally safe and economically viable manner. Storage tanks in the chemical process industries (CPI) can be most…
Energy Efficiency: Tracking Natural Gas With Flowmeters
Thermal mass flowmeters provide advantages over other options for metering the consumption of natural gas by individual combustion units throughout the facility With today’s increased emphasis on strategic energy management, many throughout the chemical process industries (CPI) and elsewhere are…