United States
The specialty chemical and active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) chemical industries are undergoing a paradigm shift in process technology by converting existing batch processes to continuous processes. This shift is primarily motivated by significant benefits in throughput, purity, safety, footprint, and modularity.
This 3-day course, developed by Worcester Polytechnic Institute in collaboration with the ACS Green Chemistry Institute as part of a RAPID project, provides attendees with the hands-on skills and tools needed to identify potential opportunities for processes to be optimized using continuous process technology which can lead to smaller carbon footprints, greener operation, safer operation, and higher throughput or product purity. The course will integrate recent trends in continuous processing to train the existing and future workforce in modern engineering and process intensification principles. The course will be predominantly lab-oriented, where participants will design, construct and test reactor systems to study fundamental properties needed to transition from batch to flow (e.g. heat transfer, mixing, multiphase systems and controls). Additionally, the course will include augmented reality (AR) modules as a teaching and expertise archival tool for in-lab training.