Plant-Independent Process Representation

Abstract

Of the traditional process representations commonly used by chemical engineers, flow diagrams or Process and Instrumentation Diagrams represent the interconnections between plant items, and mass and energy balances present the flow, composition, and conditions at the inlets and outlets of the plant items. It is only during detailed modelling of particular unit operations does the engineer normally address the physicochemical processes that are happening inside the equipment. The rapid leap from process to plant considerations creates a language barrier between engineers and chemists that potentially slows down process development and gives rise to scale-up problems as the controlling processes are overlooked. A simple representation of chemical processes has been devised that focuses on the controlling phenomena that ultimately should allow processes to be scaled-up much more easily.