de - Beste verfügbare Techniken (BVT) - Umweltbundesamt

Chapter 2
2.2 Multipurpose plants
Multipurpose plants enable the operator to manufacture different products with a certain
flexibility according to market requirements. Figure 2.2 gives an impression of the arrangement
in a typical plant, which uses gravity flow for efficient material transport. The main components
in the multipurpose plant are:
• raw material storage (warehouse, tank farm)
• reactors and vessels
• finished and intermediate storage
• utilities (e.g. cooling, vacuum, steam, cleaning)
• process control systems
• feed tanks (usually upper floors)
• purification and separation equipment
• recovery and abatement facilities
• blow-off systems and catch tanks.
Production campaigns with batch wise, semi-batch or continuous operation of reactors and
facilities for product work-up alternate with shutdown, cleaning and start-up situations.
Figure 2.2: Typical layout for a multipurpose plant
The example schedule given in Figure 2.3 shows the utilisation of 17 vessels in a production
building on a multipurpose plant with 22 different products/intermediates (shown as different
colours). This picture could vary drastically over the year due to a possibly changed market
situation. The use of the capacity varies from 60 to 95 %. Lower values would be critical from
an economic point of view. Higher values would represent a real challenge from an operational
point of view.
22 Dezember 2005 OFC_BREF