Senior Plant Design Competition Winners Announced
Top presenting teams have been announced for the Senior Plant Design Competition in partnership with Ineos Olefins & Polymers USA (INEOS).
The event, part of the Process Design and Operations course known as “plant design”, had 19 teams presenting design solutions to tackle a real-world engineering challenge put forward by INEOS representatives.
This semester’s challenge was to convert sour water, or wastewater associated with oil and gas production processes, from a refinery to a viable alternative stream or to find a way to dispose of the water in a safe manner. Removing sulfur from the water for either industrial or agricultural use was also a consideration.
Teams gave a 45-minute presentation and were evaluated by industry representative and VP of Operations Jim Harris from INEOS and Professor Michael Poehl, the course instructor.
“This semester’s presentations closely resembled a professional design,” said Jim Harris, VP of operations at INEOS. “I was particularly pleased with the blending of commercial and engineering approaches to problem solving taken by many of the groups. It demonstrated not only good engineering skills, but excellent at least potential commercial acumen, which is a very important success factor in our industry.”
Teams were assessed on teamwork, visual aids, technical merit and innovation, forecast capital and equipment specs, energy optimization and financial evaluation, site evaluation, risk analysis, process flow diagram controls and health and safety.
The winning teams are:
| FIRST PLACE
Front row: Clarissa Wedemeyer, Alexa Felices, Jim Harris (Judge, INEOS), Petter Kaalstad |
SECOND PLACE
Front row: Keegan Bush, Mason Hill, Jim Harris (Judge, INEOS) and Will Richardson |
|
THIRD PLACE
Front row: Jordan Silverman, Chelsea Clark, Jim Harris (Judge, INEOS) |
Tags: competition, engineering, INEOS, jim harris, Michael Poehl, plant design, sour water, sulfur removal, teamwork, wastewater, winners