A process systems engineering approach for managing the complexity

Rafiqul Gani

CAPEC, Department of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering, Technical University of Denmark, DK-2800 Lyngby, Denmark

Process systems engineering (PSE) has been traditionally concerned with the understanding and development of systematic procedures for the design, control, and operation of chemical process systems. It emphasizes the development and use of systematic approaches to problem solution as well as understanding of the important issues. The oil & gas industry, the petrochemical industry and to some extent, the chemical industry have been the traditional users of methods and tools, including software, from the PSE community. Indeed, it is routine these days to perform a detailed mass and energy balance for a process through one of several process simulators that have been developed by the PSE community. Problems related to process optimization, process integration and process synthesis/design are currently routinely solved through knowledge based techniques as well as mathematical optimization techniques. Also, systematic methods and tools have been developed and applied to solve industrial problems in the area of planning and scheduling, on-line optimization, solvent selection/design and many more.

The above developments have been possible because of the availability of sufficient knowledge and data related to the relevant process engineering problems and an interest from the industry for collaboration with academia for their solution. This encouraged the development of reliable process simulation models that together with the available knowledge and data lead to the development of systematic (and/or computer aided) methods and tools for a wide range of problems for the chemical process industries. Most of the above developments can be linked to chemical processes involved with the manufacture of high volume bulk chemicals and the related industries. To a lesser extent, these methods and tools have also been applied to the manufacture of low volume specialty chemicals.

In the areas of chemicals based products, energy, sustainability, biosystems engineering, and enterprise-wide optimization all of which may be viewed as new opportunities for PSE, however, simply replacing experiment-based solution approaches with computer-aided systems will not provide the desired innovative solutions. Addressing these problems will require a systematic multidisciplinary approach where the model (including data) may come from different sources and multiple factors (process operation, product quality, cost, sustainability issues, time, etc.) may need to be considered to identity the truly innovative solutions. Here, a systematic model-based framework that can play the role of the “integrator” or “glue” is necessary. That is, a fast, efficient, reliable and robust model-based framework that is able to manage the complexities at different scales of size, time and problems. Such as a computer aided framework will generate and use multiscale models, design experiments to collect and analyze data, use in-house methods and tools for process-product monitoring systems (and their design), for optimization of the enterprise, for product-process development. The presentation will illustrate the main ideas through interesting problems in process-product engineering.

Professor Gani's principal research interest is the use of a systems approach to solving problems in process and product synthesis, design and analysis. In particular, his research covers the development of systematic (computer aided) methods and tools for solving problems from the petrochemical, chemical, specialty chemical, agrochemical, food and pharmaceutical industries, which can be classified in terms of the following topics:

• Modelling (chemical processes and their operations, chemical products and their behaviour / properties)
• Synthesis, design and analysis of chemical products and their processes (CAMD and CAFD)
• Process integration (sustainable process design)
• Tools integration and software architecture

Professor Gani currently holds the following positions:

• Chairman of the research committee and member of the leader team of KT
• Co-Editor of Computers and Chemical Engineering journal
• Series Editor for Computer Aided Chemical Engineering book series of Elsevier Science B. V.
• Member of the Executive Board of the EFCE (European Federation of Chemical Engineering)
• Member (and past chairman) of the EFCE working party on CAPE (Computer Aided Process Engineering)
• Member (and past chairman) of EURECHA (European Committee for Use of Computers in Chemical Engineering Education)
• Member (and past Chairman) of the PSE Executive Committee
• Member of editorial board of Chemical Engineering Patent journal

Professor Gani has published more than 150 peer reviewed journal articles, 4 edited books and has made more than 200 conference presentations as invited plenary, keynote, oral and/or poster presenter. He has also given invited lectures/seminars at numerous companies and academic institutions and has organized several workshops on topics related to CAPE/PSE. He is the 14th Professor Roger R W H Sargent Lecture on "Models, Modelling and Process Systems Engineering - What Next?", at CPSE, Imperial College, London (lecture given on 6th December 2007).

More: http://www.capec.kt.dtu.dk/People/Rafiqul-Gani-Co-director/