Chemical Process Industries Research Articles

Multi-Hazard Coupling Effects in Chemical Process Industry—Part I: Preliminaries and Mechanism

As one of the typical safety-critical systems, the chemical process industry (CPI) is congested with high-risk industrial processes, usually prone to the so-called multihazard coupling scenarios. One of the toughest challenges is analyzing the mutually amplified phenomena between various hazards, known as “multihazard coupling effects.” Despite the increasing attention devoted to the emerging research field, there still is no systematic and comprehensive review to summarize and overview multihazard coupling studies in CPI. In this two-part systematic and comprehensive review, 184 relevant grey- and peer-review literature are extracted and analyzed to systemize knowledge, identify research advances, and investigate future perspectives. In the first part of this article, preliminaries are first provided for the whole two-part review, including the origin and development of multihazard related research, the research procedure, and the discrimination of specific research interests. Then, the mechanism behind the formation of the mutually amplified phenomena between hazards is especially concerned. Based on the regional disaster system theory and the extracted knowledge, a comprehensive and inclusive framework is developed to generalize the analysis of multihazard coupling effects, and five general forms of multihazard coupling effects are identified, which provides insights for multihazard coupling scenarios to better understand the coupling hazard-formative mechanism.

Multi-Hazard Coupling Effects in Chemical Process Industry—Part II: Research Advances and Future Perspectives on Methodologies

This is the second part of the review on multi-hazard coupling effects in chemical process industry (CPI) in which the existing methodologies on different topics related to multi-hazard coupling effects are especially concerned. To obtain a better insight into the current research, a preliminary categorization is performed based on two research topics and five corresponding research issues. The research advances and gaps are investigated. It turns out that the related research is still in its infancy. There is still a fertile field for future research. Based on the gaps in previous research, perspectives on the future development in this emerging research field are provided from four aspects: coupling hazard-formative mechanism analysis, modeling the multi-hazard coupling effects with advanced uncertainty analysis approaches, dynamic risk assessment for complex CPI system, and accident prevention from system resilience perspectives. This review provides academics with the picture of the interconnections among different categories of studies and helps the researchers to identify the research advances and future perspectives in this field.

A hybrid deep belief network-based label distribution learning system for seismic damage estimation of liquid storage tanks

Liquid storage tanks play a vital role in the modern chemical process industry (CPI). The strong ground motion caused by large-scale earthquakes may easily impose severe structural damage on liquid storage tanks, leading to a series of catastrophic cascaded events. The seismic damage estimation of liquid storage tanks is a challenging problem, as the fluid-structure interaction exhibits extremely complicated and non-stationary response behavior. This study develops a novel data-driven methodology to estimate the seismic damage state probability distribution of liquid storage tanks in the contexts of label ambiguity and data imbalance. With the support of the advanced deep learning framework, synthetic oversampling methods, and label enhancement techniques, a hybrid deep belief network-based label distribution learning system (HDBN-LDLS) is proposed for probability distribution learning. The proposed HDBN-LDLS is evaluated on the widely used ALA database. Simulation results indicate that HDBN-LDLS can achieve a balanced estimation for all damage states while maintaining sufficient robustness to cope with label ambiguity. The reliability of the obtained data-driven model is validated by a damaged tank in the 2006 Silakhor earthquake. For practical applications, a more natural way to estimate a seismic damaged tank is to assign a membership degree to each possible damage state. The proposed methodology can quickly obtain the seismic damage state probability curves of a specific liquid storage tank, which can be used to support quantitative risk assessment and seismic design.

Advances in bioreactor control for production of biotherapeutic products.

Advanced control strategies are well established in chemical, pharmaceutical, and food processing industries. Over the past decade, the application of these strategies is being explored for control of bioreactors for manufacturing of biotherapeutics. Most of the industrial bioreactor control strategies apply classical control techniques, with the control system designed for the facility at hand. However, with the recent progress in sensors, machinery, and industrial internet of things, and advancements in deeper understanding of the biological processes, coupled with the requirement of flexible production, the need to develop a robust and advanced process control system that can ease process intensification has emerged. This has further fuelled the development of advanced monitoring approaches, modeling techniques, process analytical technologies, and soft sensors. It is seen that proper application of these concepts can significantly improve bioreactor process performance, productivity, and reproducibility. This review is on the recent advancements in bioreactor control and its related aspects along with the associated challenges. This study also offers an insight into the future prospects for development of control strategies that can be designed for industrial-scale production of biotherapeutic products.

Green Light Photoelectrocatalysis with Sulfur-Doped Carbon Nitride: Using Triazole-Purpald for Enhanced Benzylamine Oxidation and Oxygen Evolution Reactions.

Materials dictate carbon neutralindustrialchemicalprocesses. Visible-light photoelectrocatalysts from abundant resources will play a key role in exploiting solar irradiation. Anionic doping via pre-organization of precursors and further co-polymerization creates tuneable semiconductors. Triazole derivative-purpald, an unexplored precursor with sulfur (S) container, combined in different initial ratios with melamine during one solid-state polycondensation with two thermal steps yields hybrid S-doped carbon nitrides (C3 N4 ). The series of S-doped/C3 N4 -based materials show enhanced optical, electronic, structural, textural, and morphological properties and exhibit higher performance in organic benzylamine photooxidation, oxygen evolution, and similar energy storage (capacitor brief investigation). 50M-50P exhibits the highest photooxidation conversion (84±3%) of benzylamine to imine at 535nm - green light for 48h, due to a discrete shoulder (≈700)nm, high sulfur content, preservation of crystal size, new intraband energy states, structural defects by layer distortion, and 10-16nm pores with arbitrary depth. This work innovates by studying the concomitant relationships between: 1) the precursor decomposition while C3 N4 is formed, 2) the insertion of Simpurities, 3) the S-doped C3 N4 property-activity relationships, and 4) combinatorial surface, bulk, structural, optical, and electronic characterization analysis. This work contributes to the development of disordered long-visible-lightphotocatalysts for solar energy conversion and storage.

Controller design on a new 2DOF PID structure for different processes having integrating nature for both the step and ramp type of signals

Chemical reactors, heat exchangers, level-loops, and distillation columns are commonly encountered in the chemical process industry, and these are having a significant role in the functioning of any chemical process. For the smooth and efficient functioning of any such process, a robust control law design is an important work to be considered. In this paper, a modified 2DOF robust PID control law has been developed to ensure satisfactory performance in both the step and ramp type references and disturbances. Controller parameters are derived with Maximum sensitivity, Gain, and Phase margin specifications. Case studies with different chemical processes like CSTR, distillation column, heat exchangers, and boiler drum level-loop are included for both the nominal and perturbed cases. Lastly, a performance comparison of ISE (Integral of square error), ITAE (Integral time absolute error), IAE (Integral absolute error), and Total variation (TV) of the control signal is also included.

Welcome to Volume 3 of ACS Engineering Au

ADVERTISEMENT RETURN TO ISSUEEditorialNEXTWelcome to Volume 3 of ACS Engineering AuVivek V. Ranade*Vivek V. Ranade*Email: [email protected]More by Vivek V. Ranadehttps://orcid.org/0000-0003-0558-6971 and Linda J. Broadbelt*Linda J. Broadbelt*Email: [email protected]More by Linda J. Broadbelthttps://orcid.org/0000-0003-4253-592XCite this: ACS Eng. Au 2023, 3, 1, 1–2Publication Date (Web):February 15, 2023Publication History Received10 January 2023Published online15 February 2023Published inissue 15 February 2023https://doi.org/10.1021/acsengineeringau.3c00001Copyright © 2023 American Chemical SocietyRIGHTS & PERMISSIONSACS AuthorChoiceCC: Creative CommonsBY: Credit must be given to the creatorNC: Only noncommercial uses of the work are permittedND: No derivatives or adaptations of the work are permittedArticle Views77Altmetric-Citations-LEARN ABOUT THESE METRICSArticle Views are the COUNTER-compliant sum of full text article downloads since November 2008 (both PDF and HTML) across all institutions and individuals. These metrics are regularly updated to reflect usage leading up to the last few days.Citations are the number of other articles citing this article, calculated by Crossref and updated daily. Find more information about Crossref citation counts.The Altmetric Attention Score is a quantitative measure of the attention that a research article has received online. Clicking on the donut icon will load a page at altmetric.com with additional details about the score and the social media presence for the given article. Find more information on the Altmetric Attention Score and how the score is calculated. Share Add toView InAdd Full Text with ReferenceAdd Description ExportRISCitationCitation and abstractCitation and referencesMore Options Share onFacebookTwitterWechatLinked InReddit PDF (1019 KB) Get e-AlertsSUBJECTS:Chemical engineering and industrial chemistry,Energy,Gold,Materials,Physical and chemical processes Get e-Alerts

Functionalization of cellulosic and polyester textiles using reduced Schiff base (RSB) of eco-friendly vanillin.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10570-023-05085-z.

Biofilm formation by sulphate-reducing bacteria on different metals and their prospective role in titanium corrosion

ABSTRACT This study describes the biofilm formation by sulphate-reducing bacteria (SRB) on different materials, which has implications for the biomedical, pharmaceutical, food and chemical process industries. SRB was chosen as a model organism being an anaerobic bacterium. Biofilm formation on different materials and corrosion of titanium by SRB were monitored with time using confocal laser scanning microscopy and fluorescent FISH probes were used to authenticate the SRB strain. The thickness of the mono-culture SRB biofilm has ranged from 4 to 24 µm during thed 12–84 hr; however, the maximum biofilm thickness (24 µm) was recorded after 60 hr of growth. Planktonic growth of the SRB strain showed a log phase up to 48 hr and the sulphide production ranged from 2 to 14 mg l−1. For a comparative account, the SRB biofilm formation on copper was chosen as a positive control. Finally, the putative role of extracellular electron transfer by SRB in the biocorrosion process and the plausible mechanism of pitting corrosion of titanium is described in detail.

Tuning Structures and Microenvironments of Cu-Based Catalysts for Sustainable CO2 and CO Electroreduction

ConspectusThe carbon balance has been disrupted by the widespread use of fossil fuels and subsequent excessive emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2), which has become an increasingly critical environmental challenge for human society. The production and use of renewable energy sources and/or chemicals have been proposed as important strategies to reduce emissions, of which the electrochemical CO2 (or CO) reduction reaction (CO2RR/CORR) in the aqueous systems represents a promising approach.Benefitted by the capacity of manufacturing high-value-added products (e.g., ethylene, ethanol, formic acid, etc.) with a net-zero carbon emission, copper-based CO2RR/CORR powered by sustainable electricity is regarded as a potential candidate for carbon neutrality. However, the diversity of selectivities in copper-based systems poses a great challenge to the research in this field and sets a great obstacle for future industrialization.To date, scientists have revealed that the electrocatalyst design and preparation play a significant role in achieving efficient and selective CO2-to-chemical (or CO-to-chemical) conversion. Although substantial efforts have been dedicated to the catalyst preparation and corresponding electrosynthesis of sustainable chemicals from CO2/CO so far, most of them are still derived from empirical or random searches, which are relatively inefficient and cost-intensive. Most of the mechanism studies have suggested that both intrinsic properties (such as electron states) and extrinsic environmental factors (such as surface energy) of a catalyst can significantly alter catalytic performance. Thus, these two topics are mainly discussed for copper-based catalyst developments in this Account.Here, we provided a concise and comprehensive introduction to the well-established strategies employed for the design of copper-based electrocatalysts for CO2RR/CORR. We used several examples from our research group, as well as representative studies of other research groups in this field during the recent five years, with the perspectives of tuning local electron states, regulating alloy phases, modifying interfacial coverages, and adjusting other interfacial microenvironments (e.g., molecule modification or surface energy). Finally, we employed the techno-economic assessment with a viewpoint on the future application of CO2/CO electroreduction in manufacturing sustainable chemicals. Our study indicates that when carbon price is taken into account, the electrocatalytic CO2-to-chemical conversion can be more market-competitive, and several potential value-added products including formate, methanol, ethylene, and ethanol can all make profits under optimal operating conditions. Moreover, a downstream module employing traditional chemical industrial processes (e.g., thermal polymerization, catalytic hydrolysis, or condensation process) will also make the whole electrolysis system profitable in the future. These design principles, combined with the recent advances in the development of efficient copper-based electrocatalysts, may provide a low-cost and long-lasting catalytic system for a profitable industrial-scale CO2RR in the future.

Modeling the effect of emergency response on domino effects in the coal gasification process by fuzzy hierarchical analysis and Bayesian network.

Emergency response has an important impact on the mitigation of the domino effects. However, consequence analysis of the domino effect often ignores emergency response due to its complexity and uncertainty. In this paper, Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (FAHP) is adopted to evaluate the reliability of emergency response process. On this basis, using Bayesian Network (BN) model, the domino effect under the influence of emergency response is modeled. Based on the total duration of the above-mentioned emergency response process to determine the consequences of domino effect under the action of safety barriers. The application of the approach has been demonstrated by an illustrative case study. The results show that the probability of domino effect is reduced by an order of magnitude when active barriers, passive barriers and emergency response are considered together. This work can provide relevant basis for formulating safety protection measures in chemical process industry.

Efforts to Replace Methylene Chloride in Pharmaceutical Process Chemistry

Methylene chloride (MC) or dichloromethane is a halogenated organic solvent of choice used in many chemical industries such as pharmaceutical, insecticide, paint, and polymer industries. Several health hazards associated with the use of MC are known to us through available literature. MC is reported to be a potential neurotoxic, cardiotoxic, cancer-causing, and tissue-damaging agent. Inhalation and direct skin contact are the major routes of exposure to MC in occupational environments. Most government agencies and environment, health and safety forums throughout the world have recognized MC as a hazardous solvent and have kept strict regulatory control on the usage of MC. MC is a Class 2 solvent as per ICH guidelines. This review article presents some case studies where MC has been replaced in commercial synthetic processes and column chromatography by other solvents and solvent mixtures, demonstrating that it is possible to either reduce the usage or replace MC in process chemistry. Many industrial and academic efforts have brought in place several solvent selection guides helpful for effectively replacing MC from existing or planned synthetic processes. Sustainable and environment-friendly synthetic processes can be developed by implementing the concept of green chemistry, such as replacing the use of MC in the existing chemical processes and avoiding the use of MC in future chemical processes. Successful introduction of MC-free chemical processes in the pharmaceutical industry can surely be achieved with continuous efforts in this direction.

Mesoporous zeolite Beta supported Ni nanoparticles for the catalytic hydroconversion of extraction portion from Jinjitan subbituminous coal to cycloalkanes

The catalytic hydroconversion (CHC) of heavy carbon organic species (HCOSs) to cycloalkanes represents an importantly used chemical industry process due to the wide applicability of the resulting products in energy and fine chemistry. Despite the existing conventional catalysts applied to the CHC of HCOSs, the development of highly active bifunctional Ni-based heterogeneous catalysts for this process is still a challenge. Therefore, we show that the modified deposition–precipitation of nickel (II) nitrate on hydrothermally synthesized mesoporous zeolite Beta (MZB) prepares a Ni/MZB catalyst with a through-crosslinking mesopore structure and uniformly disperse Ni nanoparticles (NPs) at rough MZB crystal surface. The 10%Ni/MZB (10% Ni loading), in the presence of exposing on amount of accessible Lewis acid sites (LASs) and attaching Ni NPs by chemical bonding from the silica matrix of MZB skeleton, exhibits excellent activity to promote the CHC of all kind of aromatic rings and heteroatom-containing species, including chain alkanes, arenes, oxygen-containing organic compounds (OCOCs), nitrogen-containing organic compounds (NCOCs), and sulfur-containing organic compounds (SCOCs), to produce cycloalkanes and hydroarenes under mild conditions. Interestingly, density functional theory (DFT) calculations indicate that the transfer of biatomic active hydrogen (H…H) and heterogenous H+ from 10%Ni/MZB plays important roles during the CHC of diphenoxybenzene (DPOB). After being recycled 4 times, 10%Ni/MZB is still maintains high activity for CHC of DPOB under mild conditions.

A review on techno managerial approaches to energy optimization in chemical process industries

The chemical process industries, being energy intensive in nature, still struggle to strategically and sustainably consider energy management issues. Energy sustainability depends on a sustainable energy supply, consumption, and waste disposal. This paper analyses current energy management and optimization in industries and also attempts to identify the significance of incorporating energy management into the strategic perspectives of industry through an exhaustive literature review. To ensure the optimization of energy, the paper illustrates the importance of adopting a techno-managerial approach that integrates the technical aspects of energy conservation with relevant management tactics. This is also a preliminary study for proposing a framework for Indian chemical process SMEs to systematically overcome various challenges and seize the opportunity to ensure optimized energy utilization, thereby highlighting the framework’s long- and short-term benefits. The suggestions in the paper would help these industries and local- and national-level policymakers to improve their energy footprint and make the world more energy sustainable.

Experimental and modeling study of gas flow characteristics in the compressible powder bed during gas pressurization

Gas pressurization of powder beds is important in some industrial chemical processes. This paper describes an experimental and modeling study of gas flow characteristics in the compressible powder bed during gas pressurization. Powder compression characteristics under gas pressurization and gas permeation characteristics in the powder are obtained. The average compression ratios of the coal powder bed are larger than that of the glass powder bed. The source of this gas-induced compression and the corresponding characteristics are analyzed. The pressure drop across the powder bed increases to a maximum and then decreases during pressurization. The mechanisms for the pressure drop evolution are discussed. Furthermore, a model considering both the porosity change and the effect of the particle shape is proposed to describe the gas flow in the compressible powder bed during pressurization. The model provides acceptable predictions for the pressure drop in the compressible powder bed.

A Study on the Application of Dynamic Risk Assessment in Chemical Process Industries

In conventional Quantitative Risk Analysis (QRA) process it is unable to use the accident precursor information to revise the risk profile. One of the main disadvantages is its inability to update the risk during the life of a process. Dynamic risk assessment can be used to overcome this disadvantage. Dynamic risk assessment refers to a risk management framework where frequent updates of risk evaluation information are used to evaluate the risk outcome. This uses accident precursors such as near misses and incidents to estimate likelihood of all possible end states while conventional QRA uses on static basis considering only major accidents and events. So these updated risk profiles which results from dynamic risk assessment can lead to more accurate decision making. In this paper the dynamic risk assessment methodology is discussed in detail. First, potential accident scenarios are identified and represented in terms of an event tree, next, using the event tree and available failure data, end state probabilities are estimated. Subsequently, using the available accident precursor data, safety system failure likelihood and event tree end state probabilities are revised. Finally, the updated probabilities are used in revising the risk profile of the process system. It is more useful in chemical process industries as well as nuclear, aerospace and aviation industries where there is high likely hood of occurrence or several losses. In this research, the significance of dynamic risk assessment is demonstrated with respect to hydrocarbon storage tanks

Numerical investigation on pressure oscillations in steam condensation from injection of subcooled water

Steam-water direct contact condensation phenomenon is commonly found in many industries like chemical process industry, nuclear industry etc. In this work the injection of subcooled water into a steam filled pipe has been studied computationally. As a result of steam-water interaction within the pipe the pressure oscillates, which may cause damage to piping system or equipment. The effects of water inlet velocity, water inlet temperature, steam pressure and degree of steam superheating have been studied on the amplitude of pressure oscillations. The first and second dominant frequencies of pressure oscillations have also been obtained and studied. For most of the cases, the first dominant frequency peak was observed in the range ~ 0-1400 Hz whereas, the second dominant frequency peak was in the range ~ 2500 Hz – 3000 Hz. The first pressure peak was observed near the inlet of subcooled water such that its amplitude was increasing with increasing inlet water velocity but was nearly independent of inlet water temperature. Similarly, degree of steam superheating has no noticeable effects on pressure oscillations. It was observed that at a constant water temperature and water injecting velocity, the location of the pressure peaks was independent during the study. Further, the dominant frequency prediction map has been developed for the steam-water interaction in a pipe. The present study is assumed to be beneficial towards unfolds various important facts regarding steam-water interaction in the relevant industrial applications.

Sanacija radnog kola centrifugalne pumpe od cirkonijuma

Zirconium and zirconium alloys have their main application in the chemical industry as a corrosion-resistant construction material, since it shows excellent resistance in most aggressive environments such as organic and inorganic acids, salt solutions, strong alkalis and some molten salts. Some of the more important pieces of equipment in the chemical process industry where zirconium and its alloys are used include evaporators, tanks, reactor vessels, pumps, valves and piping. Considering the importance and high cost of such parts, repair welding occupies a significant place in maintaining such equipment. This paper presents the technology of repair welding of the centrifugal pump working wheel in the plant for the production of acetic acid. It is made of cast zirconium alloy Zr 702. Within the framework of the research, an analysis of the basic and filler material for the repair welding process was performed, and welding parameters and conditions were defined. In order to verify the proposed technology, trial welding was performed and based on the good results obtained, repair welding of the working wheel of the centrifugal pump was performed. The quality of the performed repair was checked by visual control and penetrant control, and it was found that the surfaced layer meets the quality level according to the SPRS EN ISO 5817 "B" standard. The fact that the repaired working wheel has been in the production process for 8 years, is a proof of well-defined technology and successfully performed repairs.

Measurement and Prediction of Droplet Entrainment in Inclined Liquid–Liquid Flow by PLIF Method

Inclined liquid-liquid two-phase flows widely exist in petroleum, chemical, and other important industrial processes. The study of droplet entrainment in inclined flow is of great significance for investigating the heat/mass transfer between phases and optimizing the industrial production processes. In this study, a planar laser-induced fluorescence (PLIF) system is designed to visualize the inclined liquid-liquid flows. The silicone oil (organic phase) and water/glycerol mixture (aqueous phase) are used as the experimental media. The length and amplitude of the interfacial waves are derived from the flow visualizations. The relationship between the critical wavelengths and Froude number is explored to indicate the transition from stratified flow (ST) to stratified flow with mixing at the interface (ST&MI). The wave aspect ratio is derived to characterize the instability and breakage of the interfacial wave. Meanwhile, the entrainment ratios of dispersed droplets in the continuous phases are detected, and the effects of the flow rate and the interfacial shear on the droplet entrainment are studied. Finally, a physical model is developed to predict the droplet entrainment ratios based on the force balance analysis of the interfacial wave. In general, the developed model is effective in predicting the droplet entrainment ratio with mean absolute errors of 0.015 and 0.023 for the organic and aqueous droplets, respectively.

Optimization of chemical synthesis with heuristic algorithms.

Optimizing reaction conditions to improve the yield is fundamental for chemical synthesis and industrial processes. Experiments can only be performed under a small portion of reaction conditions for a system, so a strategy of experimental design is required. Bayesian optimization, a global optimization algorithm, was found to outperform human decision-making in reaction optimization. Similarly, heuristic algorithms also have the potential to solve optimization problems. In this work, we optimize these reaction conditions for Buchwald-Hartwig and Suzuki systems by predicting reaction yields with three heuristic algorithms and three encoding methods. Our results demonstrate that particle swarm optimization with numerical encoding is better than the genetic algorithm or simulated annealing. Moreover, its performance is comparable to Bayesian optimization without the computational costs of descriptors. Particle swarm optimization is simple and easy to perform, and it can be implemented into laboratory practice to promote chemical synthesis.