Faruque Hasan, an assistant professor in the Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering and a Texas A&M Energy Institute faculty affiliate, along with his students Salih Emre Demirel and Jianping Li, both chemical engineering doctoral students at Texas A&M University, co-authored an article titled, “A Building Block Approach to Process Intensification,” that was included in the March 2019 issue of Chemical Engineering Progress (CEP) Magazine, which is published by the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE).
The article demonstrates a new approach that represents individual chemical processes using a layout of abstract building blocks. Each building block, or chemical process, can be arranged or re-arranged as appropriate for various situation. By breaking down individual chemical processes into this structure, it allows chemical engineers to elegantly represent and modify design possibilities and devise intensification pathways – all based on the underlying principles of a growing mindset and approach called process intensification.
According to the article, “Process intensification is a design activity that substantially improves one (or more) of several process performance metrics, including size, energy efficiency, environmental footprint, and safety. Intensification can be achieved by exploiting the synergies, trade-offs, and dynamics between and among multiple competing phenomena that exist within a process.”
The article highlights the possibilities of process intensification to provide transformative solutions for various challenges within chemical process industries.
To read the full article, visit https://www.aiche.org/resources/publications/cep/2019/march/building-block-approach-process-intensification