Process Analysis and Simulation in Chemical Engineering

This textbook illustrates and explains the power of process simulation for the analysis of chemical processes and for the conceptual design of unit operations. In recent years, the evolution of informatics tools has opened a broad spectrum of possibilities in the use of applications for process integration, dynamic analysis, costs evaluation and conceptual design of separation and reaction operations. This book discusses the importance of process simulation for process safety, green engineering, economic profitability, and other areas. This textbook will have worked examples and proposed exercises at the end of each chapter. The solutions manual for the exercises will be available to instructors. The authors, having thoroughly tested this material in the classroom, first introduce the fundamentals of process simulation in steady state, and then discuss process simulation in the context of various important principles of chemical engineering. Practical examples abound and make this book relevant also for industrial practitioners. The book closes with optimization, dynamic analysis of processes, and case studies.

Ivan Dario Gil Chaves

Dr. Gil is a Professor of Chemical Engineering at the Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering at National University of Colombia – Sede Bogota. He received B.S. and MSc degrees from National University of Colombia. He obtained his Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering at University of Lorraine (France) and National University of Colombia (under joint supervision). Gil has participated in some industrial projects in the area of process design and control; mainly he has collaborated with representatives of Aspen Technology in Colombia in advanced process control applications. He was also instructor at Andes University in Colombia. Currently, he teaches university courses in modeling and simulation, process control, reaction engineering and process design. In addition, he presents some short courses in advanced process control and process synthesis and optimization. Dr. Gil is co-author of several publications in peer review journals on process design and control. His research interests include biofuels, with emphasis on fuel ethanol and the use of extractive distillation to dehydrate mixtures ethanol-water; modeling, simulation and control of reaction and separation operations; nonlinear geometric control and vapor liquid equilibrium.

Javier Ricardo Guevara Lopez

Javier Guevara holds a B.Sc. in Chemical Engineering from National University of Colombia. He is a process engineer with experience developing Conceptual, Basic and Detailed engineering for oil & gas industry. Guevara works as process engineer in Y&V - Bohorquez Ingenieria SAS in Colombia. His interests include process design, process simulation, gas processing, relief systems, and upgrading of gas plants.

Jose Luis Garcia Zapata

Garcia Zapata is a Researcher with the Heavy Oil and Oilsands group at Alberta Innovates Technology Futures (AITF) in Edmonton, Canada. He holds B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in Chemical Engineering from the National University of Colombia (2010) and the University of Alberta (2013), respectively. Garcia has worked as a Process Engineer for BRINSA S.A., a salt and chlor-alkali Company in Colombia, and has been responsible for the design and commissioning of pilot scale reactors for heavy oil upgrading at the University of Alberta. His interests include process design, pilot plant, produced water treatment, and upgrading of heavy oil. He is registered as an Engineer-in-Training in Alberta.

Alexander Leguizamon Robayo

Alexander Leguizamon is a graduate student at Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU). He holds a B.Sc. in Chemical Engineering from National University of Colombia and is currently carrying out his master in Chemical Engineering at NTNU. Alexander has worked in distillation process design and simulation. He carried out a design project of a formaldehyde plant with Dynea in Lillestrom, Norway. He is currently studying with the process systems engineering group at NTNU and working on a plantwide process control project for sweetening of syngas for the Swedish chemical company Perstorp.

Gerardo Rodriguez Nino

Dr. Rodriguez is a Professor of Chemical Engineering at the Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering at National University of Colombia – Sede Bogota since 1988. He teaches Mass Transfer Operations, Material Balances, Chemical Engineering Laboratory courses in the area of Unit Operations. He obtained B.S., MSc and Ph.D. degrees in Chemical Engineering from National University of Colombia. He was the chief of the chemical engineering laboratories during 5 years, and in charge of coordinating the laboratory essays for the industrial applications. He has participated in different projects for enterprises such as Preflex, Vaselinas de Colombia S.A, Coljap, Cyquim de Colombia, Carboquimica S.A, Epsa and Alcalis de Colombia. In the last years he has developed research projects in Ethanol dehydration by extractive distillation with ethylene-glycol and glycerine for the production of fuel alcohol, and in the study of the usages of fusel oil generated in Ethanol production. His research interests include distillation design, esterification, catalysis and essential oils production.