Process requirements, equipment specification

Environmental Controls in Production. Environmental permit requirements should be evaluated based on the commercial-scale material balance and new equipment specifications. Testing requirements for environmental evaluation should include acute fish and invertebrate toxicity for raw materials, intermediates, and products biodegradation of raw materials, intermediates, and products microbial growth inhibition of raw materials, intermediates, and products water coefficients (KOW) and water solubility for raw materials, intermediates, and products and waste treatability test results. Particular emphasis should be placed on the evaluation of the compatibility of the new process waste streams with the existing waste-treatment systems. If any process waste streams require off-site disposal into regulated hazardous waste landfills, leaching experiments may also be required. 

Table 7-4 provides rough guidelines for applications in the laminar and turbulent flow regimes. Equipment selection and sizing should be based on application engineering to meet specific process requirements. 

In selec ting the machines of choice, the use of specific speed and diameter best describe the flow. Figure 10-67 shows the characteristics of the three types of compressors. Other considerations in chemical plant service such as problems with gases which may be corrosive or have abrasive solids in suspension must be dealt with. Gases at elevated temperatures may create a potential explosion hazard, while air at the same temperatures may be handled qmte normally minute amounts of lubricating oil or water may contaminate the process gas and so may not be permissible, and for continuous-process use, a high degree of equipment rehability is required, since frequent shutdowns for inspec tion or maintenance cannot be tolerated. 

Many processes require equipment designed to rigid specifications together with automatic control and safety devices. Consideration should be given to the control, and limitation of the effects, of equipment malfunction or maloperation including ... 

The standard requires purchasing documents to include, where applicable, the title or other positive identification, and applicable issue of specification, drawings, process requirements, inspection instructions, and other relevant technical data, including requirements for approval or qualification of product, procedures, process equipment, and personnel. 

The records of qualified personnel using special processes should be governed by the training requirements covered in Part 2 Chapter 18. Regarding the equipment, you will need to identify the equipment and facilities required within the process specifications and maintain records of the equipment in terms of ... 

The equipment and systems of the processing phuit are designed to contain tlie chemicals mider processing conditions and to provide tlie controlled environment required for production. This equipment is designed to function under both specific process conditions and upset conditions. Upset conditions tliat are considered in design include fire, explosions, and accidental chemical releases. 

Chemical engineering performance design for specific items of equipment required for a flowsheet, and mechanical interpretation of this to a practical and reasonable specification. Here the process requirements are converted into hardware details to accomplish the process end results at each step in the product production process. 

Product size is limited to available equipment that can handle the size and pressure as well as other processing requirements. Also involved are factors such as packaging and shipment to the customer. The ability to achieve specific shapes and design details is dependent on the way the process operates. 

Some plastics can be worked by many different processes, but others require a specific process (Fig. 10-9). Process selection can take place before material selection, when a range of materials may be available, or made first to meet performance requirements and only then have the applicable process or processes chosen. (Chapter 7, SELECTING PLASTIC and Chapter 8, SELECTING PROCESS) Usually, in the latter situation only one special process can be used to provide the best performance-to-cost advantages. A particular design group may have its own processing capabilities. Unfortunately, some operations use just whatever equipment is available. This situation could either be very unprofitable, limit profitability, or restrict product... 

A particular shape of reactor, its specific internals, arrangements made because of special properties and/or behaviour of the reaction mixture, etc. are used as criteria to qualify a reactor. In fine chemicals manufacture two main groups of cylindrical reactors are in common use, viz. stirred-tank reactors with a small aspect ratio, and column reactors with a relatively large aspect ratio. Both types can be equipped with specific internals depending on process requirements. Researchers and designers are well acquainted with these reactors. A tendency to duplicate known equipment usually wins when considering the choice of reactor for a particular process. As a consequence, more and more stirred-tank reactors and column reactors are in use. 

There are various uncertainties in all the data influencing the selection of a set of equipment uncertainties in recipe parameters, product specifications, processing times and size factors, equipment availability, product requirements, and resource availability. Data needed for the evaluation of processing times and equipment sizes are never 100% reliable. The market situation when the plant is started up will certainly be different from the situation at the time of the definition of a production program for the plant. Unpredictable process disturbances may also occur. 

Capital cost estimates for chemical process plants are often based on an estimate of the purchase cost of the major equipment items required for the process, the other costs being estimated as factors of the equipment cost. The accuracy of this type of estimate will depend on what stage the design has reached at the time the estimate is made, and on the reliability of the data available on equipment costs. In the later stages of the project design, when detailed equipment specifications are available and firm quotations have been obtained, an accurate estimation of the capital cost of the project can be made. 

The spacing recommendations for process layout have been presented in literature as matrixes and lists of the typical minimum distances between different process items (Industrial Risk Insurers (1991) Bausbacher and Hunt (1993) Prugh (1982)). A suitable distance to another process item depends mostly on the safety properties of the process items. The clearance required for maintenance and access determine usually shorter spacings compared to safety clearances. In some references access and maintenance clearances are given separately. Therefore it can be assumed that the average of the recommended equipment spacings is mostly related to the general unsafety of a specific process item. 

Relevant material properties as well as process and equipment-specific parameters are completely known for the examples and the solutions proposed. However, the parameters are of a strong abstract nature and are only detailed to the extent needed for the examples. Required calculations were done in accordance with the literature given in the guideline. 

Indeed, the need for capital investment in a CMO may not have been originally anticipated or planned for and may impact on the whole decision making process. Additional costs and time need to be set aside for training and equipment validation, e.g. PQ/IQ/OQ (process qualification/ installation qualification/ operational qualification), and if this includes equipment with radically different operating principles than currently available on site then additional costs will be required for equipment-specific operating personnel and training. 

For computerized process equipment, the regulatory requirements are very specific, and these are detailed in Section 9.6.3. 

Task Analysis— An analytical process for determining the specific behaviors required of the human components in a man-machine system. It involves determining the detailed performance required of people and equipment and the effects of environmental conditions, malfunctions, and other unexpected events on both. Within each task to be performed by people, behavioral steps are analyzed in terms of (i) the sensory signals and related perceptions, (ii) the decisions, memory storage, and other mental processes, and (iii) the required responses. 

---