Learn Before You Lock your FOAK FOAK-projecten in de chemie falen zelden op techniek, maar vrijwel altijd op timing. Organisaties denken risico te beheersen door vroeg prijs, scope en planning vast te leggen. In werkelijkheid zetten ze technische onzekerheid om in commerciële verplichtingen. Bij FOAK-chemie is scope geen vast gegeven, maar iets dat ontstaat. Yields…
After every inspection, engineers fill out a form, called a “inspection sheet” which tells maintenance technicians about problems within the plant. The technicians correct the problems, document their repairs on the form, then the plant engineer review the inspection sheets before the next startup. Never let it be said that technicians and operators lack a…
Combine Raschig rings, outdated distributors, and hot process vapour. A textbook case of “looks good on paper.” Our mission: evaluate whether an existing quench tower with dual packed beds, a demister, and a mixture of recycled liquid and rising vapours could actually perform as intended. Our findings The demister? Works like a charm The distributors?…
Gas Cleaning đ§Şđ¨ The reactor is brilliant. The gas? A chemical horror movie. Like always: the idea starts at the top. Pyrolysis, gasification, cracking in general. The core concept is revolutionary. Flowsheet: slick. Catalyst: promising. Deck: investor-proof. But somewhere downstream? A single arrow says âclean gas to compression.â What actually comes out: tar, acid mist,…
It always starts nobly: “letâs recover energy!” and ends with a PFD full of arrows (more than in a medieval battlefield) and an energy balance that only makes sense in PowerPoint. We took a deep dive into a drying installation, including an air preheater, a ring dryer, and a heat pump with an appetite for…
đĽâťď¸ Hot oil, cool solution One of our favourite puzzles: how do you keep vapours hot enough for controlled condensation â without making everything else overheat? We were brought in to troubleshoot control issues in a high-temperature condensation section. The unit used 90°C water, which turned out too cold for the desired condensation temperature…
đ˘ď¸âď¸ When your tankfarm handles more than just product, things get interesting. Vapors, pressure build-up, tricky drainage â and that eternal question: âWhere does this line actually go?â We ran a feasibility and redesign study on a multi-tank setup for volatile liquids. The system had everything: vent headers, flame arrestors, condensers, vacuum pumps â and…
We were asked to draft a Request for Quotation for a critical engineering package. Not review one but write it. From scratch. Because the last time someone tried, they used a recycled vendor checklist and called it procurement strategy. So we built an RFQ the way it should be done: âď¸ Clear scope split, not…
We dove head-first into a high-temp conversion process with one goal: reduce utility use, cut costs, and make the most of every degree and every molecule. Enter: extruders, reactors, quench towers â and a dreamy process flow diagram whispering âI want to be efficientâ. đ The reality check: Heat integration? Possible⌠in theory. But extruders…
It runs. Itâs stable. But is it secure? Modern operations blend old and new: Proven PLCs, smart sensors, remote access, cloud-connected historians… But somewhere between uptime and innovation, security became a checkbox or worseâ a half-documented âtemporaryâ fix. We were asked to review such a system. It worked, until we looked closer: Static…