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Processing facilities are complex systems of unit operations and streams. Consequently,
their environmental impact cannot be optimally mitigated by simple
end-of-pipe measures. Instead, it is crucial to gain global insights into how mass
flows throughout the process and to use these insights as a consistent basis for developing
cost-effective pollution-prevention solutions. These global insights can
help in extracting simple solutions from complex processes without the need for
laborious conventional engineering approaches.
Over the past decade, significant advances have been made in treating chemical
processes as integrated systems. This holistic approach can be used to enhance and
reconcile various process objectives, such as cost effectiveness, yield enhancement,
energy efficiency, and pollution prevention. In this context, a particularly powerful
concept is mass integration, which deals with the optimum routing of streams as
well as allocation, generation, and separation of species. Many archival papers
have been published on different aspects of mass integration. These papers have
mostly targeted researchers in the field of process synthesis and design. This book
was motivated by the need to reach out to a much wider base of readers who are
interested in systematically addressing pollution prevention problems in a costeffective
manner. |