Date:8 May 2002

Subject: NeSSI Forum, CPAC Meeting, May 6-9, 2002

To: NeSSI Forum AttendeesFrom: Ulrich Bonne, Honeywell

Summary

Peter vanVuuren introduced this Forum and the NeSSI objective and reviewed past work by the NeSSI Team. Rob DuBois discussed the issues that need to be worked and which will be included in the proposal to DoE. Mel Koch recognized the founding members with a "Loch-Nessy" award and Ken Creasy shared the double-block and bleed NeSSI design he has worked out with Swagelock and Parker-H. to date. U.Bonne outlined the main tasks and schedule of the DoE proposal, which we have been invited to present at the June '02 Steering Committee Meeting of DoE. The envisioned schedule would be to win an open-bid contract by June '03, complete the hardware design, lab test and field test fabrication of NeSSI units by June '04, and install, monitor and report on the field test and project by June '05. Peter and Rob voiced concerns that this schedule is not aggressive enough and would like to have NeSSI units available for field test sooner.

Much good feedback was received from those present during the ensuing open discussion and encouraged feedback, from which I was able to draw up the lists on Applications (from the attendees list), perceived NeSSI benefits, and presently available sensors, see below.

Process Applications of NeSSI

  1. Petrochemical - fractionation (??)1R.DuBoisDow
  2. Petrochemical - cat.cracker (??)1P.vanVuurenExxonMobil
  3. Refining2-3Don YoungChevronTexaco
  4. Cooling water
  5. Water treatment
  6. Power industry, boiler feedwater quality monitoring1DuPont
  7. Stack gas monitoring1J.AndrisaniDuPont
  8. Distillation1Paul BarnardEquistarChem
  9. Pharmaceutical processing and quality validation and control1Bob ReedMerck
  10. Pharmaceutical1Steve DohertyPharmacia
  11. Gas purification1F.SchweighartAirProducts
  12. Fine Chemicals1Steve WrightEastman
  13. Refrigerant processing1Paul VaheyHoneywell
  14. Glass processing (natural heating value, DO2 monitoring)1

Total 12

Savings and Benefits to Process Industry (="Users"). Feedback from NeSSI Forum of 8 May 2002, CPAC

  1. Reduced capital, design and installation costs
  2. Lower cost barrier to introduce process stream sampling and analysis; savings (increased plant efficiency or throughput) relative to "efficiency" NeSSI retrofit
  3. Missed quality in 7 batches (worth $1M/each) resulted in $7M worth of wasted product
  4. Help to automate sample taking and analysis (lab vs. on-line)
  5. Increased reliability, i.e. reduced down time because of NeSSI's modular design and smart communication (warning before sampling/sensor down time; "self-check"?)

Savings can be computed on the basis of the economic justification in today's business environment: NeSSI and its predecessors need to pay for themselves in less than 6 months.

Sensors & Act. Available for NeSSIStatus

  1. Electrical conductivity Demo at IFPAC by Rosemount
  2. pH
  3. O2 in solutionProduct by Ocean Optics
  4. Moisture
  5. UV-vis (gas or liquid?)?
  6. GC and HPLC
  7. Total organic carbon in water
  8. Stack gas analysis (O2)
  9. P, T, FlowPlanned by Honeywell
  10. Combi-ValvePlanned by Swagelok