In February 2019, BASF has founded the new company BASF Digital Solutions located in Madrid, Spain to drive forward the digital transformation of the group and develop innovative IT solutions. The company plans to grow the center to more than 300 digital specialists within the next years.

Bulkflow Technologies is a world leader in the indirect heating and cooling of powder and bulk solids in many industries worldwide (chemicals, polymers, fertilizers, detergents, minerals, oilseeds, grains, food products, sugar and biosolids). In the last few years, Bulkflow has introduced this technology to the sugar industry, where it has been established as a proven and effective method of cooling sugar crystals before storage and packaging. The Bulkflow system can be installed as either a primary or a secondary cooler, and is readily adaptable to plant retrofits.

Tomorrow's automation technology starts today. From field device daily routine through the chances of modularization up to data mining. Suspense and excitement continued on the second day of the Namur Annual General Meeting. Here, it was clearly palpable: The modernization tempo that users and operators in the process automation have jointly unleashed has increased significantly.

Bayer Technology Services wants to stay on the growth curve. For that to happen, the company has to find the right balance between its internal and external customer base. Dr. Dirk Van Meirvenne, who took over as CEO on June 1st, answered a series of questions from PROCESS Editor-in-Chief Gerd Kielburger.

This year decanter specialist Flottweg celebrates its 75th anniversary. The decanters are used for continuous separation of suspended solids from liquids, clarification of liquids, and classification of fine particles. But, it all began with a motor...

Under the contract, Axens and Exxon Mobil will market and deliver all technologies associated within a refinery alkylation block. Together, the companies will also offer technologies to produce high octane gasoline.

BASF commissioned Rockwell Automation to modernize an automation system in a loading bay used for polymer dispersions at the company’s Ludwigshafen Verbund site in Germany. With only eight months to plan the new system and just three days for commissioning, the project required an extraordinarily structured approach and an intensive test phase. The result is a system with high levels of flexibility and availability as well as easier maintenance.

The goal of debottlenecking is to increase production capacity at an existing plant by making modifications to the equipment configuration or workflow. This is accomplished by eliminating bottlenecks that limit throughput. It can be an extremely profitable exercise for users, because in most cases debottlenecking adds extra capacity at a fraction of the cost of new build or expansion. PROCESS has put together some practical examples.

The Gravejo (Poland) plant of particle board manufacturer Pfleiderer was too frequently replacing high-pressure pumps on its production lines. The pumps play an essential part in the main continuous production process, delivering resinous glue to nozzles where it is sprayed on to the wood fibers.

Users increasingly look at the foreseeable lifetime costs of a planned investment when making their investment decisions. Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) is, in that regard, always also a question of how good the seal engineering is. How long do seals in fact last? The Parker Seals group has developed processes which not only investigate this question, but provide the answers. They make forecasting of lifetimes possible where previously they were impossible in this way.