26 March 2019
DETAILS
- Optimized pilot plant facility infrastructure
accelerates research projects - Highly automated testing facilities
for continuous data supply - Professional data management
simplifies the planning and analysis of experiments
BASF today officially opened
a pioneering research center
at the heart of the Verbund site in Ludwigshafen,
close to the famous Ammonia Lab.
This new pilot plant facility for
catalyst and process development
will be operated by the global research unit
Process Research & Chemical Engineering.
It houses highly automated experimental facilities
for efficient process development and
testing of new process catalysts.
The highlights of the modernized lab include
modular construction of the testing facilities,
the use of digital technologies
to better visualize and manage the pilot plant facilities,
and a digitalized working environment.
To implement this concept, a 60-year old building
was completely gutted and updated over the past two years.
Now that the cutting-edge research facility
has opened on the ground floor,
renovations will continue on the floor above.
BASF is investing a single-digit million euro sum each year
in this complex project.
Once the upgrades are completed in a few years,
this building will be
the central hub for experimental work
with automated pilot plants
for liquid and gaseous substances.
Particular focus on user-friendliness and data security
During the planning and construction of the pilot plants,
some of which are modular, aspects such as
user-friendliness and easy maintenance
were just as important as
the aim of simplifying work processes via digitalization.
The pilot plants can be managed and monitored
from separate quiet workspaces or
directly in front of the pilot plant
via computer, tablet or smartphone.
With the software hteControlTM,
experimental programs can be visually planned
and carried out with various distributed control systems.
Measurement and analysis data are automatically collected,
logically amalgamated
and made available for further evaluation.
Professional data management completes the concept
of the new technical center.
The individual data systems at the pilot plants
are perfectly harmonized.
Seamless integration of process and analytical data
enables automatic integration and evaluation of processes.
Employees now have the optimal conditions
to discover new solutions
for process development and catalysis.
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Dr. Detlef Kratz,
head of the research unit
Process Research & Chemical Engineering
“With the increasing importance of
the BASF segments Chemicals and Industrial Solutions,
there is a growing need for
product research and especially process research,”
“In our pilot plant facility, we are using
state-of-the-art infrastructure to carry out experiments.
This enables us to pursue new research approaches
and reduce the length of research and development projects,
while also continuing
to improve the quality of the data collected.
We are thus systematically pursuing our goal of
increasing the likelihood of success of our projects.”
Contact BASF SE
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