Abstract
In both my technical project and my STS research project, I investigate the design and operations of chemical processing facilities. These facilities are the core of chemical engineering and have many aspects to be considered, such as reactor design, safety practices, and economics. It is important to understand these various facets of processing plants, as they are fundamental to all industries, whether it be the agriculture or semiconductor industries. Therefore, in my technical project, I focus on the design and feasibility of a recycling plant, and, in my STS research project, I explore the safety culture and risk management, or lack thereof, of a chemical plant. With these different perspectives, I can better understand the design of chemical facilities in both my academic and professional careers.
My technical project is the design of a polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic recycling plant that uses molecular recycling as opposed to mechanical recycling. In our design, we employed molecular recycling via methanolysis, which uses methanol to break down the PET into its monomers and reforms the plastic into equal quality plastic. Numerous unit operations were designed in this facility, including various plastic sorting and washing equipment, chemical reactors, distillation columns, and heat exchangers. This proposed design processes 114,000,000 kilograms per year of post-consumer PET and is estimated to produce 76,000,000 kilograms per year of bottle-grade PET, yielding an annual gross revenue of $137 million and an internal rate of return of 12.9%. Following the economic analysis, we concluded that this project is viable but would recommend further investigation before a full “go” decision.
My STS research project also examines the design of a chemical plant, however it analyzes the safety culture of BP in the 2005 Texas City incident, where a BP refinery exploded, killing 15 workers and injuring 180 others (CSB, 2007). Many studies investigate this incident using a utilitarian perspective, but I instead analyze this tragedy with the perspective of care ethics, which draws morality from the experiences of other humans and mutual relationships. I argue that BP was not just a utilitarian failure, but also a failure to act morally under care ethics. My research project uses four pillars described by Tronto: attentiveness, responsibility, competence, and responsibility to describe BP’s moral shortcomings (1993). The actions and behaviors of BP executives were a failure across multiple moral frameworks, however, by using care ethics to study the incident, I hope to prompt alternative perspectives to analyze engineering responsibility.
By working on my technical project and STS research project simultaneously, I have gained a fuller perspective of chemical engineering design and safety behavior. In designing the PET recycling facility, I have learned how to implement reactor design, heat exchanger design, and separations design into a complete system. I also learned of various safety measures to implement in my design, but safety is not found in solely the design—it also arises from a strong safety culture. My STS research project showed me how fundamental a strong safety culture, like caring management and caring systems, is to a safe chemical processing facility. A crucial aspect to process safety is learning from mistakes, and studying BP’s mistakes in my STS research project alongside my technical project enhanced both of these projects.
