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    Chemical Engineering Science, Vol. 43, No. 7. pp 1427-1435.1988.

    0009-2509188 $3.00 + 0.00

    Printed in Cheat Britain.

    0 1988 Pergamon Press plc

    THIRD P. V. DANCKWERTS

    MEMORIAL LECTURE

    PRESENTED AT THE INSTITUTE OF DIRECTORS, LONDON, U.K.

    4 MAY 1988

    CHEMICAL ENGINEERING’S GRAND ADVENTURE

    OCTAVE LEVENSPIEL

    Chemical Engineering Department.

    Oregon

    State University, Corvallis, OR 97331-2702, U.S.A.

    Fellow chemical engineers, I am honored that you

    have invited me to speak to you today. On this

    occasion, most memorable for me, I ask that you

    join me in exploring an important but little con-

    sidered aspect of our activities.

    Let me start by proposing that the mission and

    essence of chemical engineering is to come up with

    processes to make materials wanted by man-new

    or improved processes to replace older less efficient

    ones, and processes to make completely new

    materials. In a nutshell we are the chefs of science

    and technology, and as I put it here, it’s a two-step

    affair-conceiving or dreaming up a scheme, and

    then making it come real.

    The second step of this affair, transforming the

    idea into reality and teaching how to go about it is

    what concerns most of us most of the time, and we

    are very good at this. But what about the first step of

    this two-step affair, the creative or inventive step,

    the dreaming up of a scheme? Who does this and

    how does the doer go about doing it? Can this be

    taught and if so how is it taught today, and who

    teaches it? It is this first step in the development of a

    process that I wish to talk about today.

    Let me illustrate what I mean with a quick

    example. A while ago Japanese chemists discovered

    that hot (450°C) liquid indium was a versatile

    catalyst, capable of making a variety of useful

    reactions go, as shown in Slide 1. However, in all

    Dehydrogenotion reaction

    I-

    5

    Reactant -

    I-z

    +

    cOnverSIOn

    Liquid lndlum

    -450=X

    ethanol - acetaldehyde

    2 - butanol

    - MEK

    cyclohexonol

    - cyc10hexon0ne

    I sopropanol

    - acetone

    Slide 1

    cases, conversion to product was low, between 1 and

    5%. With this information let’s try to come up with a

    good scheme to treat 1 ton/day of feed (iZiG =

    0.1 kg/mol) to 90% conversion, if experiments give

    2% conversion for a gas feed rate of 1 cm3/s over a

    reaction boat containing 1 g of liquid catalyst.

    The first thought is to directly scale up from

    experiment. However, a quick back-of-the-envelope

    calculation shows that this would require about 6800

    tubes in parallel, each containing over 110 boats of

    catalyst, as sketched in Slide 2. But at fl.Yg, the

    cost of catalyst alone comes to about fl million.

    And how would you like to engineer such a process?

    I think you will agree that we should be able to do

    better.

    A second thought is to try the bathtub reactor of

    Slide 3. This would require 12 tons of catalyst

    costing f18 million? Out of the question.

    A third idea would use the spray tower, as shown

    in Slide 4. This would use less catalyst, about

    f500,OOO worth, but this still is awfully costly. And

    how would we overcome the mechanical problems

    of dealing with a hot liquid?

    These direct approaches just don’t seem practical.

    So let us put on our innovative thinking caps. If we

    are imaginative enough we may come up with the

    scheme of Slide 5. Mix, pelletize, calcine, reduce,

    pack and then run with hot gas. What a simple idea

    No need to handle hot liquid, and all it requires is

    Direct scale up

    , ton/day

    of feed

    Ll3 reactIonboats

    per tube

    Slide 2

    1427

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    1428

    OCT VE LEVENSPIEL

    Bath tub reactor

    12 tons of indium

    ,,f-at 450-C

    / .

    1

    :

    Slide 3.

    Spray

    column

    Everything --

    at 450°C

    Slide 4.

    SLC - supported liquid

    catalysts

    MIX -

    PelW 1ze

    - carc1ne

    -8CUs:

    WS

    >

    8

    %

    mvers,o”

    I

    Reduce wth Hz

    -4oo’C

    Specks of In

    03- 20$.,,

    Pack and hecat

    to 350°C

    Reactant

    US Pat 4.224.190

    Slide 5.

    just a few grams of indium for the whole operation,

    costing not much more than a good dinner in

    London today.

    Why didn’t I think of it? A team at the Danish

    Technical University headed by Professor John

    Villadsen did, and I wonder what

    it was

    in their

    background that led them away from the traditional

    thinking about bubble columns, spray columns and

    the like to come up with this unconventional and

    neat idea, so simple and obvious in hindsight.

    Maybe this is a good place to look at what we do

    teach future chemical engineers and see where we

    encourage this kind of creative thinking. Put simply,

    Slide 6 shows what we do in typical chemical

    engineering programs. At the BS level we prepare

    the young chemical engineer primarily for plant

    operations. Then in postgraduate programs we focus

    on research in a variety of areas: physicochemical

    information, theory for predicting behavior, design

    methods, ways of optimizing operations, and so on.

    All this has as its final goal the transformation of a

    design concept into an efficient reliable process for

    making a product material.

    But what about the breakthroughs which lead to

    new and better processes. As shown in Slide 6 this

    can follow the discovery of a new chemical pathway

    or the creation of a new catalyst. It can also come

    from dreaming up a new contacting concept.

    Gossett’s twig-filled windmill to give Britain’s first

    industrial absorber, and Villadsen’s supported liquid

    catalyst are such examples. This third step in Slide 6

    is something which we in the educational world in

    large part ignore. Why? Maybe we don’t know how

    to teach it, maybe we consider it to be unteachable.

    Let us see whether we can gain an insight into this

    activity by seeing how our profession actually goes

    about doing it. For this let’s select two examples,

    pertinent today, for which there are many possible

    routes from given reactants to given products.

    First consider the production of liquid fuel from

    shale rock. The concept is simple and is shown in

    Slide 7. In step 1 shale rock is heated to about

    500°C. This drives off the organics but leaves some

    fixed carbon on the rock.

    One

    may follow this

    primary operation with a second step in which the

    fixed carbon is burned off the rock with air. This

    releases heat which is then recycled to heat the raw

    , Operate with understanding

    1

    * Handle emergencies

    I

    Tmlnlng

    I

    * Make lmpmvements

    of

    i

    * Theory

    developing

    .

    .

    Language new processes

    Innovations

    - New catalyst

    * New reoctlon pathways

    * New contoctlng patterns

    Slide 6.

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    Chemical engineering’s grand adventure

    Downflow moving

    Raw shale

    beds

    0

    1429

    Liquid fuels from shale

    RCIW

    shale

    rnck

    step

    I

    Heat,

    no

    q

    lr

    .

    1

    t

    I

    I

    tieat

    released In step

    2

    )

    X-e-- may be used to

    _____-x

    feed stepl

    Slide 7.

    shale in the first step. Without step 2 one has to use

    some other source of energy, usually a part of the

    volatiles produced, to heat the shale rock.

    This looks like a simple straightforward operation

    so why shouldn’t one single design concept emerge?

    With autos we have settled on four wheels, for

    railroads two tracks, for commercial aircraft one

    body with just one wing on either side, so shouldn’t

    we all agree on moving beds or multifluidized beds,

    or something else? Well, many large organizations

    have worked on this and a whole host of distinctly

    different design concepts have been selected, as

    listed in Slide 8.

    Let me sketch some of these concepts to show you

    how different they are. First of all there is the

    downflow moving bed of solids. As shown in Slide 9,

    there are a number of commercial processes operat-

    ing today which have opted for this approach. These

    are not small pilot scale operations. For example the

    Petrosix uses an 11 m i.d. unit, and the Brazilians

    are planning to build 19 more of these giants. Slide

    10 shows a horizontal moving bed design, in

    operation today in Mexico. And to complete the

    picture of moving-bed designs Slide 11 shows a U.S.

    Counterflow

    moving beds

    cross

    f low

    n-wing beds

    Clrculoting

    solid schemes

    IGT

    Poroho

    Occidental

    union 011

    Pet robros

    c

    Kerr - McGee

    Kwiter

    Superior Oit

    Cities

    Chevron

    LUrQl

    AX0

    Shell

    I

    Rod iont heot

    M~crowove heat

    Vacuum extraction

    Molten solt

    From “Oil Processing TechnOloQy” (Edited by V. D. Allred 1

    Center for Professional Advancement. 1982

    Slide 8.

    Paroho

    Klviter

    Tosco

    8 Petrosix

    (II rn i.d.1

    Volotiles

    Air or product

    go=

    Cold product

    gas

    Spent shale

    Slide 9.

    Superior Oib

    horizontal

    moving bed

    (merry

    -go - round)

    ws

    Slide 10.

    Unocal’s upflow moving bed

    Hot recycle ~0s

    Downflow

    of

    Qas

    Shale + C

    ze *---Rock

    pump pushes

    shale upward

    Slide 11

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    1430

    OCTAVE LEVENSPIBL

    upflowing-solids process which just produced its first

    barrel of comm ercial product la st year. Up flow,

    downflow, horizontal flow-shouldn’ one be best?

    In the suspended-solid approach, Slide 12 shows

    an all-fluidized circulating solid system ; Slide 13

    shows a variation of this in which hot and cold sh ale

    are intimately contacted in a screw conveyer; and

    Slide 14 shows the ball mill design wherein heat is

    fed to cold fresh shale by circulating hot balls.

    Most of the moving-bed processes are simple from

    the engineerin g standp oint, but do not try to recover

    the energy in the fixed carbon. Thus spent shale is

    returned to the waste dump with a portion of its

    l l

    Chevron’s STB

    m

    staged turbubnt bed)

    -bust aon

    lift p*pe

    _ Downflow of soltds

    =

    I

    -3cm/s

    Solids recycle

    rotio = 2- 5

    Slide 12

    Lurgi

    - Ruhrgas

    IL1

    meatgrinder)

    Solid recycle rotio = 2 - 4

    and fuel

    Tosco II

    n

    ball miW

    3:

    “I

    Elevator

    i

    .I

    _ Lift pipe

    Raw shale

    /

    c I-bt waste gas

    carbon burn

    UP

    Slide 14.

    energy unextracted. On the other hand, the

    fluidized-bed processes are more complicated, but

    in most cases they are designed to extract all the

    energy from the shale.

    Some designs go to great lengths to recover the

    energy from the fixed carbon. As an example Slide

    15 shows U.S. Shell’s concept. The left half of the

    slide with its two fluidized beds and its circulating

    heat-carrying steel balls has just one purpose, to

    transfer heat from hot spent shale to fresh cold

    shale.

    Look at the designs of Slides 12, 13 and 15. In

    their very differen t ways they all try to recycle heat

    from spent shale to fresh shale. Thus solid-solid

    heat exchange is the problem here, and an efficient

    way of doing this may then be the key to a good

    shale process.

    We chemical engineers are quite comfortable with

    fluid-fluid heat exchange. There are books upon

    books on this subject. But what about solid-solid

    heat exchange? There is hardly anything

    on

    this

    Shell’s Spher 3 bed concept

    _..-..

    Hot balls

    Ti

    ‘-/

    Slide 13.

    Siide 15.

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    Chemical engineering’s grand adventure

    1431

    topic in the literature, and not one word on it in

    Perry’s Handbook. So let us probe in the literature

    to see what is available.

    Slide 16 shows Professor Leung and Chong’s

    proposed shell-and-tube design. Unfortunately, for

    shale processing,

    temperature limitations and

    stability of operations would be serious problems

    with this design. Slide 17 shows a somewhat simpler

    alternative proposed by Professor Potter which uses

    side-by-side fluidized beds, and this design could

    possibly be incorporated into a shale process.

    But now let our minds wander and explore other

    ideas. Why not consider using heat pipes? These

    devices were made practical about 25 years ago, and

    are widely used today in consumer electronics and in

    space applications. Even the Alaska pipeline uses

    close to 100,000 of them. They are most efficient

    heat transfer devices which can be designed to

    operate in various temperature ranges from below

    room temperature to 1000°C and higher, and in any

    orientation-vertical, horizontal or around corners.

    Slide 18 shows how heat pipes could be used in a

    solid-solid heat exchanger. Sketch A shows what

    happens when we just pour solids down past finned

    heat pipes. Heat transfer is rapid, but unfortunately

    Leung and Chong’s SBT exchanger

    Slide 16.

    Cooted fluidized

    solids out

    Hwted fluldized

    solids out

    Potter’s fluidized exchanger

    l-lot

    solids

    Cold

    sol Ids

    Slide 17.

    Heat pipe s/s heat

    (A)

    0°C

    100°C

    exchanger

    48°C

    52°C

    (El

    Upflow of condensate

    Slide 18.

    this arrangement represents cocurrent heat ex-

    change for which the maximum heat recovery

    efficiency is only 50%.

    Of course if we are able to coax one stream of

    solids to flow upward then we could approach 100%

    efficiency. But how do you coax solids to flow

    upward on their own? However, there is a simple

    alternative. Rearrange the heat pipes as in sketch B

    of Slide 18. This results in a downflow of both solid

    streams with counterflow heat exchange and close to

    100% heat recovery efficiency. Even better still,

    locate the cold unit above the hot unit, as shown in

    sketch C. Then the working fluids in all the heat

    pipes condense in the upper unit and flow down to

    the lower unit, a more efficient arrangement.

    So why not consider incorporating heat pipes into

    a shale process. Slide 19 shows a possible design.

    With no need for very fine solids, no fluidizing gas,

    gravity flow of solids throughout the exchanger

    section, a process with this type of heat exchanger

    should be much simpler than many of the present

    designs on which so much effort and money have

    been spent.

    In looking at all these different ways of extracting

    oil from shale rock-in fluidized beds or moving

    beds, using upflow, downflow or horizontal flow of

    shale, with or without using inert heat-carrying

    solids-it should be evident that it is the first

    step

    in

    the development of a process, the choice of process

    concept, that we are considering here. Maybe you’ll

    agree with me that this is the crucial step in the

    development of a process, because once the process

    concept is chosen it determines the path to be taken

    in all the supporting research, testing, development

    and design which follows.

    In general terms, not just for shale processing,

    what I’d like to suggest is that before starting work

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    1432

    OCTAVE LEVENSPIEL

    DMB.HPC -

    downf low moving

    bed heat pipe

    Cold row stale

    concept

    (+I

    No C remains

    on solids

    (+) No N2 I”

    VOlOtlleS

    I+1 No fuel neede d

    (+) Can handle Large

    solids

    (+) S1mpte

    Cold spent shale

    Slide 19.

    on a particular process concept one should set out

    the criteria for the ideal-never mind whether

    practical or not-and then see how close one can get

    to the ideal. This requires “thinking” research,

    sitting around in easy chairs, discussing and dis-

    cussing-all this before building even the smallest of

    pilot plants.

    Let’s try this type of thinking with another system,

    the production of synthesis gas from coal. This is

    likely to become one of the most important pro-

    cesses worldwide by early next century as coal will

    progressively replace petroleum as the feedstock for

    organic chemicals.

    Slide 20 shows. in simple terms, that two reactions

    are involved: the desired reaction of coal with steam

    which is endothermic, and a combustion reaction

    which supplies the heat for the desired reaction.

    And since this would be a large-volume operation

    we’d like to use only cheap easily obtainable

    feeds-air, water and coal, and nothing else.

    Synthesis gas

    from coal

    The rdeat process should only use

    COAL. AIR

    and

    WATER

    Desired

    \

    Cool +

    steam e

    CO + H,

    +Q

    Coat + t;;:r,

    - CO, + N,)

    -

    30

    How to run these two reactions ?

    Slide 20.

    In considering this operation we spot a number of

    potential problems:

    If coal is reacted with air and steam at the same

    time then nitrogen is present in the product gas,

    and this is costly to remove.

    If we try to avoid this problem by reacting with

    oxygen instead of air, then we would need an

    oxygen plant-again cost1 y.

    We can avoid the nitrogen problem by running

    the two reactions in different locations, but then

    we have the problem of transferring heat from

    one location to the other.

    And in all of these schemes if the product gases

    are rapidly cooled then a lot of tar forms and this

    also is costly to remove. To avoid this we must

    keep the product gases hot for a while to let the

    tars crack into lower molecular weight com-

    pounds.

    These considerations lead us to jot down the

    requirements for an ideal gasification process, as

    shown in Slide 21. Let me comment on the last two

    items on this list. Thermodynamics, reinforced by

    common sense, suggests that if we want to squeeze

    the most from a process then ideally all the product

    streams should leave the process at ambient con-

    ditions.

    The last item on this list is most important, for to

    dream up a process which is basically complex is

    risky. An example of this is the CO,-Acceptor

    process in the U.S. for coal gasification. It was a

    beautiful concept and many millions were spent on

    its development. However, the developers had to

    call it quits precisely because of its complexity.

    Slide 22 shows that all sorts of schemes have been

    dreamed up for coal gasification. As you can see

    there is no agreement on the best way to gasify coal.

    Well, just for fun let us look at the four main

    schemes and see how they compare with our six

    criteria for the ideaI.

    Scheme 1 Slide 23) uses air and countercurrent

    gas-solid contacting with both reactions taking

    place in one bed. During reaction a narrow hot zone

    forms and the product gas quickly cools. The main

    problems with this design are shown in Slide 23.

    Requirements for an ideal synthesis gas process

    (+I Onky “se AIR. WATER and COAL

    (+I No N, leaves with product gas

    +I No tar or liquid formed

    (+I No O2 plant to be used

    (+I A11 flow streams Leave at room tempemture

    (+I Proc ess must be slmpk, procticol, and easy

    to opemte and control

    SIide 21.

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    Chemical engineering’s grand adventure

    1433

    Large

    moving

    bed

    Cool gasification concepts

    one

    fluldized

    bed

    1

    Two

    ftuidired

    I

    beds

    I

    Mutt i

    fluldized

    beds

    c

    - Brltlsh Gas/Lurgi SlagQlnQ

    With 0,

    Dry ash Lurgl

    Air. 02

    Gas lntegrote

    A1r

    IGI - two stage

    Air. O2

    ~erpely (USBM)

    Air

    Leuno

    0,

    Power go*

    Air

    Thyssen Galoczy

    02

    UGI water gos

    A1r

    Weltmon GoCusho

    A1r

    Wellman - Incandescent

    Air

    Woodoll Duckham

    Air

    Exxon

    Onty steam

    Hoffman

    Only steam

    HRI fast fluldized

    Air

    Synthone

    0,

    u - gas

    Air

    Wlnkter

    Air

    Battelle osh agglomerating Air

    CD, - acceptor

    Air

    Cogas

    Air

    ICI moving turden

    Air

    Westinghouse

    Air

    IGT hygos

    (3 stogesj

    02

    TrIgas

    (3 stages) Air

    CQQos

    (5 stages)

    Air

    Babcock - W11cox

    0,

    Entrained

    flow

    gasi f iers

    Bell - Aerospace

    A,lr, 0,

    Bionchi

    0,

    01 - gas

    i2 stages)

    0,

    Combustion Engineering

    Air

    Foster - Wheeler (2 stages) Air

    Koppers - Totzek

    4

    Ponindco

    Air, 0,

    Ruhrgas VOrtex

    Air

    Shell - Koppers

    Air, 0,

    Texo co

    Air, 0

    z

    Also :

    Molten baths

    From “Cool Goslflcation Concepts:’ NoyeS

    Doto Corp., krk Ridge, NJ, 1981

    Slide 22.

    Coal %

    _ CO+Hz.

    Scheme I

    l l o t

    zon

    N,

    tar

    (+) Simple

    (+I No O2 plant

    Slide 25

    .-

    - Ropld

    cooll”g

    (+ 1 Cool products

    (-1 Tar

    (-1 N, with

    product

    Scheme 4

    CO+Hz

    N, + COz

    Ash

    + air

    Slide 23.

    Cool

    CO+ a.

    Scheme 2

    tar

    “0 0,000

    $2 “0

    R

    (+I

    No N, with product

    008

    Hot zone

    ,“g

    %o _,’

    (+I Simple

    *

    ,.oea 4

    NZ

    (+ 1 Cool product

    &@$@

    &3$x8

    (-1 Tars

    V

    -Air

    (- ) O2 plant

    1

    Ash

    02

    Slide 24.

    Scheme 3 (Slide 2s) shows that nitrogen separ-

    ation is the problem with single fluidized bed

    processes, but not tar production, because the

    product gases stay hot for a reasonably long time.

    Scheme 4 (Slide 26) keeps the reactions separate

    in two or more tluidized beds. Its main problem

    concerns complexity, and the CO*-Acceptor process

    shows what happens when this question is taken

    lightly.

    There are many variations of these four basic

    designs, and we will not go into them. It suffices to

    note that none of the processes proposed or

    operating today approach, in principle, the ideals

    listed in Slide 21. This means that it may be

    worthwhile trying to conceive a radically different

    and better concept, and not just an improvement of

    existing technology.

    So, keeping the ideal in mind, let’s see what we

    can come up with. Here are two of more than a

    dozen ideas that our easy-chair research group in far

    CO + H,. N,

    Scheme 3

    Cool

    ==%I

    (+I No tar

    (+I No 0, plant

    (+I Sample

    (-1 N, with product

    (-1 Hot products

    Air + steam

    (+I No N,

    In

    product

    (+I No tar

    (+ ) No Oz plant

    needed

    (-1 Not simple

    (-1 Hot product

    Scheme

    (Slide 24) shows how the nitrogen

    problem is avoided, but unfortunately at the cost of

    an upstream oxygen plant.

    Steam

    Ajr

    Slide 26.

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    1434

    OCT VE LEVENSPIEL

    away Oregon plus one Missourian, Professor Mike

    Dudukovic, came up with.

    First, how about treating powdered coal-gas

    mixtures in parallel flow channels which are forested

    with finned heat pipes, or more properly, with

    finned thermosiphons, as shown in Slide 27? This

    would mean treating only slightly dusty gases-a

    simple matter. W e haven’ yet made the calculations

    on this type of operation, in fact we don’ even know

    whether cocurrent or countercurrent flow of the two

    stream s is better, but it would be interesting to look

    into this concept because of its simplicity.

    Slide 28 show s a comp letely different idea.

    Instead of running the two reactions at the same

    time but in different reactors, why not run them in

    the same reactor but at different times? This leads to

    the RE-GAS process, standing for regenerator-

    gasifier.

    In this operation the reactor con sists of a large

    long vertical vessel with insulated walls and packed

    with structured solid. It operates like this.

    In the first step of the cycle feed fine coal powder

    suspended in air again very dilute in solids) to

    the vessel. The coal burns, heats the bed solids,

    and a hot front slowly moves up the vessel;

    EX-GAS exchanger - gasifier) concept

    /COz Nz

    Slide 27.

    RE - GAS regenerator - gasif ier 1 concept

    N, CO,

    H, co

    t t t t t t

    tool

    Hot

    Powdered Coal

    l,r

    Powdered CQQL steam

    Heating step

    Gasif ication step

    Slide 28.

    however waste gases would leave at close to

    ambient conditions. This is shown in the first

    three sketches of Slide 28.

    At the right time switch the feed to steam and

    coal powder which on heating up and passing

    through the hot solids produces the desired

    product gas. During this operation a cold front

    slowly moves up the bed, as shown in sketches

    4-6 of Slide 28.

    At the end of the cycle only the top of the bed

    contains hot solid. One then repeats the whole

    cycle of operations, but upside d own.

    Now if we compare this scheme with the ideal of

    Slide 21 we s ee that it does satisfy a ll the require-

    men ts for an ideal process, especially the criterion of

    simplicity sinc e there is no circulation of solids

    needed and since all external piping and valving is at

    close to ambient conditions.

    At this point one can raise a number of questions

    with this type of operation. For examp le:

    would the unit plug up with ash?

    would the spread of the heat front lower the

    efficiency of operations drastically?

    would tem peratur e instabilities occur, and if so

    how could they be controlled?

    0 A re suitable materials of construction available?

    andsoon.

    Of course such questions have to be considered.

    However, answering these questions represents the

    second step in the development of a process, and as

    I mentioned at the beginning of this talk, this is

    something that we chemical engineers are good at.

    In any case, it should be noted that in principle the

    RE-GAS process is superior to those mentioned

    earlier, and so much sim pler since one is only

    pumping cool slightly dusty gases. Shouldn’ it be

    looked at?

    Let me go back to the question of conceiving new

    process concepts.

    1)

    2)

    How does an organization come to its concept

    for a process, wheth er it be the antigravity, or

    meat grinder or merry-go-round or what have

    you?

    Does the director of research com e in one

    morning and say “Okay-I’ve been think-

    ing that we should look into ball mills”?

    Is it the result of the deliberations of a

    committee?

    Does the researcher ask his technician for a

    sma ll unit, which, if success ful, is then

    scaled up again and again?

    Does the researcher deliberately look for

    something different so. as not to infringe on

    o thers’ patents?

    I don’ know what the answer is.

    Maybe the search for a process concept is best

    done by getting together a

    group of

    knowledgeable free thinkers of varied back-

    ground and interests, including mavericks,

    technicians and “wild men ”, and let them go

    at it. Ideas need time to ferment, so let them

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    (3)

    (4)

    (5)

    meet again and again

    until they all enthusias-

    tically agree that they’ve come up with the

    very best.

    tt may be risky to start out with small bench

    scale pilot plants without thinking through the

    whole operation, because as one progresses

    one has more and more invested in following

    the path which has already been chosen-not

    just money invested, but intellectual effort

    and reputation. A momentum is developed to

    follow a given path which makes it more and

    more difficult to change direction, to admit

    that some other way may be better and that

    one should maybe start afresh in a different

    direction.

    Some may suggest, especially after looking at

    all the wildly different designs on Slides 8 and

    22, that my whole discussion today may not

    be pertinent because the difference in pro-

    cessing costs may represent only a minor

    factor in the overall economics. However, in a

    large-scale operation I doubt that this is so.

    To go back to the start of my talk, I pointed

    out that the development of a process rep-

    resents a two-step affair, thinking up a good

    scheme and then transforming it into reality.

    In chemical engineering education we focus

    on the second step, and the way we teach this

    is with courses of lectures. But would this

    teaching method work with the first step?

    (6)

    Imagine trying to teach bicycle riding or

    swimming in a course of lectures

    In a way learning to swim and developing

    the knack of inventing new processes is done

    the same way-by practice, and then more

    practice, not by lectures. For example, have

    students work in teams trying to think up

    schemes for making chemical y from x.

    Encourage them to discuss, argue, throw out

    the wildest ideas, but then have them rate

    these schemes. I’ll wager that a most interest-

    ing scheme will occasionally emerge from this

    exercise.

    This sort of program would be difficult to

    set up, but isn’t this important enough for us

    educators to try?

    Finally, let me suggest that the driving force,

    the “raison d ’ t re” of our profession is the

    search for and the creation and development

    of new processes to make materials wanted by

    man. LeBlanc, Solvay, Haber-Bosch and

    ammonia,

    Ipatieff and platinum, FCC,

    penicillin production, zeolites, these words

    recall some highlights from the past. Who can

    even dream of what will be tomorrow. This

    then is the grand adventure of chemical

    engineering.

    Enough. 1 fear that I’ve left you with too many

    questions and too few answers. It is time to stop. I

    thank you for your attention.