Intelligen, Inc.

: SuperPro Designer, Batch Process Simulation, Environmental Impact Assessment

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20/01/15

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SuperPro Designer Product

Features
Intelligen's simulation and design tools (SuperPro and EnviroPro Designer) facilitate the following tasks in a variety of
industries:
Simulation of Batch and Continuous Processes
Scheduling of Batch Operations
Tracking of Resource Demand and Inventories
Cost Analysis
Cycle Time Reduction and Debottlenecking
Environmental Impact Assessment
Water Purification and Recycling
Wastewater Treatment
Air Pollution Control
SuperPro Designer is the most widely used simulator by pharmaceutical, biotech, specialty chemical, food, consumer
product, mineral processing, and related companies. SuperPro also handles water purification, wastewater treatment,
and air pollution control processes. More than 350 companies around the world have already included SuperPro in
their arsenal of everyday tools. Click here for a partial list of current industrial users.
SuperPro is also a popular teaching tool. It is already in use at more than 400 colleges and universities around the
world. Click here for a partial list of current academic users. SuperPro Designer strengthens the teaching of the
following courses:
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Biochemical Engineering
Process and Plant Design
Pharmaceutical Engineering
Food Engineering
Unit Operations
Introduction to Chemical Engineering

as well as
* Wastewater Treatment
* Water Purification and
* Air Pollution Control
SuperPro Designer equips chemical engineering students with skills that are useful in the growth sectors of the CPI
(e.g., biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, specialty chemicals, etc.). For civil and environmental engineering students,
SuperPro is useful in emphasizing the value of "systems approach" in the design and evaluation of integrated water
purification, wastewater treatment, and air pollution control processes.
The rest of this page provides a brief description of the key features of SuperPro Designer. For more detailed
information, please download the brochure and presentation documents and the manuals of the demo and full
versions of SuperPro. And if you wish to test-drive the new version, you are just a click away from the functional
Evaluation and Demo versions.

Simulation of Batch and Continuous Processes

SuperPro Designer (as well as its subset, EnviroPro) is the only commercial process simulator that can handle equally
well continuous and batch processes as well as combinations of batch and continuous. The Full as well as the
Evaluation and Demo versions of SuperPro are shipped with several examples of both kinds. For instance, there are
several environmental examples (that deal that with wastewater treatment, purification, and recycling) that are
continuous processes with multiple nested recycle loops. The biotech and pharmaceutical examples, on the other
hand, deal with batch processes, which is the dominant mode of operation in those industries.
Graphical Interface
All of our tools feature intuitive and user friendly interfaces that speak the language of process engineers. The user
models a process by developing a flow diagram (see figure below). The equipment-looking icons represent unit
operations for continuous processes and unit procedures for batch processes.
Despite the many new features and capabilities in version 4.7, all members of the Pro-Designer family (BatchPro,
BioPro, EnviroPro, and SuperPro) have maintained their intuitive and user friendly interface (see figure below). In this
environment, developing a process flowsheet or modifying values is as easy as pointandclick. The interface is very
similar to other MS Windows applications, making its features very intuitive.

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Unit Procedures
A Unit Procedure is a set of operations that take place sequentially in a piece of equipment. For instance, the P-1
vessel unit procedure (see figure above) includes the following operations: Charge Solvent, Charge Reactant A, Charge
Reactant B, Transfer to PFF-101 (see figure below). The concept of unit procedures enables the user to model batch
processes in great detail. A unit procedure is represented with a single equipment-looking icon on the screen. Multiple
procedures can share the same equipment item as long as their cycle times do not overlap.
Unit Procedures in Continuous Processes If you deal with continuous processing steps in continuous flowsheets, then
unit procedures behave like unit operations. In such situations, all interface features that are reminiscent of unit
procedures (e.g., the "Add/Remove Operations" dialog and the Scheduling tab) are hidden so that unit procedures can
be truly perceived as unit operations by the user.

Operations
For every operation within a unit procedure, the simulator includes a mathematical model that performs material and
energy balance calculations. Based on the material balances, it performs equipment-sizing calculations. If multiple
operations within a unit procedure dictate different sizes for a certain piece of equipment, the software reconciles the
different demands and selects an equipment size that is appropriate for all operations. In other words, the equipment
is sized so that it is large enough that it will not be overfilled during any operation, but it is no larger than necessary (in
order to minimize capital costs). In addition, the software checks to ensure that the vessel contents will not fall below a
user-specified minimum volume (e.g., a minimum stir volume) for applicable operations.
The initialization of operations is done through appropriate dialog windows. For instance, the figure below shows the
Oper.Cond's tab of a charge operation. Through this the user specifies either the process time (duration) of the
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operation or the charge rate (based on mass or volumetric flowrate) and the program uses that information to
calculate the duration. A third option is to the set the duration of an operation equal to the duration of another
operation or equal to the sum of durations of some other operations (through the "Set by Master-Slave Relationship"
interface). The Emissions tab is used to specify parameters that affect emissions of volatile organic compounds
(VOCs). The Labor tab is used to specify the labor requirement for this operation. The Description tab displays a
description of the process generated by the model (e.g., Charge 1000 L of Water at a rate of 150 L/min using stream
Water-A). The user has the flexibility to edit the description and enter his/her own comments for documentation
purposes. The Scheduling tab is used for specifying the Start Time of this operation relative to other events (e.g., the
beginning of the batch, the beginning or end of some other operation in the same or a different procedure, etc.).
SuperPro Designer includes more that 120 operation models. The available operations are listed on the SuperPro
page. Visit the EnviroPro page to see the list of operations in EnviroPro Designer.

Component and Mixture Databases

The registration of pure components and mixtures is something that typically precedes the initialization of operations.
SuperPro is equipped with two component databases, its own of 600 compounds and a version of DIPPR that includes
1,700 compounds (the DIPPR database must be purchased separately from Brigham Young University of Utah). It also
comes with a user database where modified and newly created compounds can be saved. All database files are in MS
Access format. Furthermore, SuperPro comes with mixture databases to represent buffers and other solutions that are
commonly used in the biotech and other industries. Again, the user has the option to create his/her mixtures and save
them in the user database.
For each pure component, the SuperPro databank includes thermodynamic (e.g., molecular weight, critical pressure
and temperature, accentric factor, vapor pressure, density, specific heat, particle size, etc.), environmental (e.g.,
biodegradation data, octanol to water distribution ratio, Henrys law constant, component contribution to TOC, COD,
BOD5, TSS, etc.), cost (e.g., purchasing price, selling price, etc.) and regulatory (e.g., type of pollutant) data.

Scheduling of Batch Operations

Gantt Charts. SuperPro generates Gantt and Equipment Utilization charts that enable users to visualize the
scheduling and execution of batch operations. The figure below displays the Gantt chart of our simple, two-step
process (reaction in a vessel and filtration). The look and feel of our Gantt chart is quite similar to that of MS Project.
The chart is highly customizable. The user has the option to expand or collapse the view of each unit procedure, cycle,
section, etc. The user may also change the colors of the chart bars, remove the labels by the chart bars, and change
the scale of the chart.
Furthermore, the Gantt chart interface provides access to all simulation data for every operation in every procedure
(that is included in the scheduling), thereby making it very easy to modify some operating condition and re-compute
the execution plan. SuperPro Designer will resolve M&E balances, re-compute the scheduling periods for all operations
and redraw the Gantt chart all in a click of a button. This is extremely important as it allows the user to visualize and
refine a recipe on either the flowsheet (main) interface or the scheduling interface.

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SuperPro also supports exporting of scheduling data (for single and multiple batches) to MS Project. The figure below
shows the Gantt chart of our simple, two-step process imported into MS Project. SuperPro scheduling links among
operations (scheduling dependencies) are retained in MS Project. Equipment, labor, energy and material resources
are automatically defined in MS Project.

Equipment Utilization Charts. The equipment utilization chart displays the utilization of the various equipment items
as a function of time for a single or multiple batches (see figure below - three consecutive batches). White space
between bars represents idle time. The equipment with the least idle time between consecutive batches (R-103 in this
case) is the time (or scheduling) bottleneck that determines the maximum number of batches per year.
A similar chart is available for clean-in-place (CIP) skid utilization. CIP skids are common time bottlenecks in the biotech
and food industries.

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Tracking of Resources
Resources (e.g., demand for labor, raw materials, heating and cooling utilities, power) are common bottlenecks in
batch manufacturing. SuperPro Designer calculates and displays the demand for such resources as a function of time.
Furthermore, for resources that can be stored, it keeps track of their inventories.
For instance, the figure below displays the demand for WFI (water for injection) for three consecutive batches of a
biopharmaceutical process. The red lines represent instantaneous demand as a function of time whereas the green
line represents cumulative demand and corresponds to the y-axis on the right. The blue line represents averaged
demand over a one-day period (the averaging period can be adjusted by the user). Limits for instantaneous and
cumulative capacities also can be displayed.

The figure below displays the labor requirement (blue lines) for four consecutive batches. The red line represents the
limit (7 operators available). Notice that for short periods of time there is a need for eight operators. If that need
cannot be met, then certain operations will need to be delayed to accommodate that constraint. Oftentimes, such
resource constraints become time bottlenecks that determine the maximum number of batches that can be processed
over a period of time.

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Inventories of Resources
For resources that can be stored (e.g., raw materials), SuperPro calculates and displays their inventory. For instance,
the figure below shows the inventory of WFI for a single batch. The blue line (the values correspond to the y-axis on the
right-hand-side) represents the level of WFI in its storage tank. The red lines represents the limits of the tank (full and
empty), and the gray lines (the values correspond to the y-axis on the left-hand-side) represent the operation of the
still that generates the WFI. The still is turned on when the liquid level in the storage tank drops below 35% and it is
turned off when it exceeds 90%. The still may also operate based on fixed on and off intervals.
During the design of a new biopharmaceutical facility, this utility of SuperPro is very useful in sizing the WFI still and the
storage tank. During manufacturing, this feature can be used to make sure that changes in scheduling and
introduction of new products do not lead to shortages of WFI and other resources.

Other Important Features of SuperPro / EnviroPro Include

Cost Analysis
Cycle Time Reduction and Debottlenecking
Environmental Impact Assessment
Water Purification and Recycling
Wastewater Treatment
Air Pollution Control

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