Benefits Study

The cost of process control, as a fraction of the total construction cost of the process, has risen substantially since the early 1960s. Then is it was around 5 %, now it is closer to 25 %. In the 1960s the view was that some instrumentation was necessary but costs should be kept low. As a result plants had the minimum of measurements - just enough for safety and operability. Much of the instrumentation was local to the process, not repeated in the control room, and most of the controllers were single loop with the occasional cascade controller. 

While some of the increased investment was driven by higher safety standards, increased environmental concerns and greater awareness of the value of process data, a large proportion of the justification derives from improved process control. In this section we focus on how those benefits can be quantified. 

The management of some manufacturing companies are so convinced of the value of improved control that they require only the most cursory examination of the benefits. While control engineers clearly welcome this approach, it is not without risk. A detailed study would ensure that reality matches expectation if it does not then it is far better to disappoint before large costs are incurred. It also supports decisions as to whether more costly options 

Process Control A Practical Approach Myke King 2011 John Wiley Sons Ltd. ISBN 978-0-470-97587-9 

An unfortunate fact is that managers move jobs. By the time it is underway the manager that fully supported the project as a no-brainer may be replaced by one more sceptical. While the decision to progress the project is unlikely to be reversed, there is a danger that the necessary ongoing costly support will be allowed to wane. The study is an oppoitunity for everyone involved to buy in to the benefits this is important for the long-term success of the project. 

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Comparative Risk-Cost-Benefit Study of Alternative Sources of Electrical Energy, Report WASH-1224, U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, Washington, D.C., Dec. 1974 Nucl Sa 17(2), 171 (1976). 

Since the Selectox process is capable of well over 90 percent sulfur recovery, the authors recommend a careful cost-benefit study to see if Claus tail gas processing should be required with such plants. It might well be found that—say—95 percent capture of sulfur in the coal conversion plant is acceptable. 

In the triazine benefits studies, there have been three methods used to estimate the on-farm economic effects. These are expert opinion of weed specialists, expert opinion combined with farmer surveys, and the CEEPES method. NAPIAP (1992), Danielson et al. (1993) Morrison et al. (1994), and Pike et al. (1994) follow the first method, while Battelle (1989,1993) uses the second method. 

During late 1994, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) published a public document (PD-1) relative to the use of triazine herbicides by American farmers. In doing so, they placed atrazine and simazine in Special Review. USEPA s PD-1 triggered a benefits study of unprecedented proportions on the following issues benefits of atrazine and simazine use economic and biological impact of the loss of these products feasibility and efficacy of alternatives environmental benefits associated with atrazine and simazine use best management practices and comparative performance of alternatives. 

Final design of the RSSF will require detailed cost/benefit studies for the entire system to determine optimum design criteria and to specify... 

Institute of Statistical Smdies. Technological Assessment of Drug Therapy-Analysis of Cost—Benefit Studies on Pharmaceuticals. Institute of Statistical Studies Tokyo, 1988. 

Waibel, H. and G. Fleischer (2002). Experience with Cost Benefit Studies of Pesticides in Germany . Paper presented at the OECD workshop on the Economics of Pesticide Reduction in Agriculture, Copenhagen, Denmark, 28—30 November 2001. 

Cost/Benefit Studies. Two studies by Mathematica, Inc., are among the current best efforts to assess programs intended to create or facilitate the secondary application of Federally-sponsored R D in the civilian economy (If , 17). The two studies are quite clearly operational assessments in that they develop data on the costs and benefits of secondary applications of NASA technology, but do not address the question of the value of alternative government roles or strategies for achieving the same objective. 

In the United States, crop protection agents used in food production are regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency, and the use of veterinary products is closely regulated by the Food and Drug Administration. Clear differences exist between the problems associated with the administration of veterinary products and the exposure of animals to crop protection agents. The use of veterinary products involves their deliberate and controlled application for benefit. Studies conducted in the development phase of a veterinary product address, in addition to the toxicology, the fate of the chemical in the test species. Withdrawal periods are set so that residues in edible tissues are at or below an acceptable concentration. 

The field work for the study was undertaken before the cost/benefit studies on the likely economic impact of REACH were published. While none of these studies concern themselves specifically with the role of eiqjosure limits, they do address the extent of ill-health related to posture to chemicals and to some extent evaluate the capacity of existing systems to reduce such harm. 

The organizations that actually pay for medicines — governments, insurers and so on—have only recently started to use the power conferred by their expenditure. A consequence is that a drug company has not only to show that its new product is safe and works, but also that it is cost-effective. In Australia, this has been spelled out in legislation. Since 1993, any drug submitted for approval there must be accompanied not only by the results of clinical trials but also by an economic impact analysis. In 1999 the UK set up a National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) to advise the National Health Service on the cost-effectiveness of health care technologies. Other countries ask formally or informally for pharmacoeconomic analysis. Economic impacts can be measured in a variety of ways, for example, cost-effectiveness, cost-utility or fuU cost-benefit studies. 

Institute of Statistical Studies (1998) Technologieal Assessment of Drug Therapy—Analysis of Cost-Benefit Studies on Pharmaceuticals, Tokyo. 

The effects of exposure and effects assessments are integrated to estimate the magnitude of and the likelihood of ecological risks. These results are fed to risk management processes in which the results are combined with engineering fea-sibiUty studies, cost-benefit studies, and political and legal considerations to arrive at a decision about potential ecological risks. 

Detailed data are generally not available in many developing countries and it is clear that if realistic air quality objectives are to be defined the necessary monitoring work and cost benefit studies need to be undertaken in order to determine the contributions made to air quality by vehicle as well as industrial and natural sources. 

Apart from economic losses, floods can cause severe societal disruption and loss of life over 1400 people lost their lives in the New Orleans flood. The Dutch government has indicated that it will explicitly consider potential loss of life when deciding on the stringency of new flood safety standards. While loss of life is monetized and included in the financial balance of cost-benefit studies, it is not evaluated separately. In another policy domain, concerned with the safety of those living in the vicinity of major industrial hazards, loss of life is explicitly taken into account in the evaluation of risks to the public. The Dutch government therefore commissioned a study about the... 

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