How the Right Analytical Methods put Process Analytics on the Fast Track

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The leverage effect available to PAT, particularly in combination with automation, is shown by an example taken from petrochemicals: A process gas chromatograph can, for example, analyse the complex input products naphtha & co. in a steam-cracker. In doing so, it measures and categorises up to 200 components and transfers the readings to the control system. “The control system can thus choose the mathematical model which best matches the process in question,” explained Peter Berghäuser, director of product management process analytics at Siemens. In view of the tonnages produced in petrochemicals, even the smallest rises in productivity have big effects. The largest naphtha steam-cracker at present – operated by BASF Fina Petrochemicals in Port Arthur, Texas – achieves a yearly output of nothing less than 920 000 tonnes of ethene.

Why We Need a Holistic Process Analytics Approach

To be able to realise such holistic PAT solutions, the analysis equipments has to capable of integration into the existing control and regulating systems of each user. “And this should be as fast as possible, at low cost and without additional programming work,” Oliver Schmitt of Malvern Instruments specified. Only thus would the user achieve a closed-loop control system utilising the stream of real-time data needed for optimum control of the process. “Inter-batch comparisons, better utilisation of installations and also the greater installation security resulting from a direct intervention capability are dependent on the immediate availability of measurement readings and direct feedback into the process,” Schmitt explained.

This is precisely where the greatest need for development lies, for the skill lies in the intelligent interlinking of data extracted from the process, thus creating soft-sensors, i.e. new quality-relevant parameters. Only then can PAT exploit its true capabilities. And yet another factor is involved: many sectors are still a long way from reaching the level of PAT implementation that is familiar in chemicals and petrochemicals. This is particularly true of biotechnology, where users have so far capitulated in front of the multiplicity of parameters.

“The Task Will Be to Open New Applications for Existing Measurement Procedures”

This is also the reason why Mathis Kuchejda, chairman of the SPECTARIS specialist association for analytical, biological and laboratory technology, sees the future of PAT somewhat more pragmatically than his colleagues in the process analytics working group. “The task in the coming years will be to open up new applications for existing measurement procedures.” In the field of fluid analytics, in his opinion, great potential is yet to be exploited, above all in pharmaceutical applications. While monitoring was previously restricted to only individual steps, there is now an increase of momentum in this area. The product manager for PAT & automation at Sartorius, Dr. Sven Groß, considers “that in an increasing number of areas users are turning to analytical and software solutions in order to raise the stability of their production processes.” The right data analysis and uncomplicated integration of the equipment will be significant in this development.

Literature

[1] Industrielle Prozessanalysentechnik

[2] Prof. Dr. Rudolf Kessler, Prof. W. Kessler: Optische Spektroskopie und Chemometrie für wissensbasierte Produkte und Verfahren, Referat VDI Wissensforum, 2011.

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