Impact of Process Simulation Tools on Process Synthesis, Analysis and Design

The combination of advances in numerical methods and the ever-decreasing cost of computational power have led to almost universal adoption of process simulation software for the design of chemical processes. Chemical engineers have overcome the challenges of adapting and customizing commercial process simulation programs to be able to address synthesis, analysis and design problems across the whole spectrum of process industries. The software vendors have worked alongside their customers to address not only customization, but also usability, speed and workflow, providing skilled process engineers with a toolkit that enables better optimization and faster development of design alternatives. Despite the great accomplishments in the field over the past forty years, there remain some significant challenges still to be addressed, and a few of these challenges will be discussed in the paper.