In today’s competitive world, companies are looking to bring new products and designs to market faster and at a higher return on investment. So, how do you achieve these objectives consistently and accurately?

AspenTech’s integrated approach provides the solution. The integration of Aspen Icarus Process Evaluator® (IPE) with the industry’s leading process simulators, Aspen Plus® and Aspen HYSYS®, allows you to quickly evaluate different process design scenarios based on accurate and standardized cost estimates. Aspen IPE uses simulator-generated heat and material balance and unit operations data to size and cost equipment including piping, civil, steel, instrumentation, electrical, paint and insulation estimates.

The integration of Aspen IPE with our process simulators delivers significant benefits:

• Increase engineer productivity
  • Eliminate the time-intensive and error-prone manual task of re-entering large amounts of data
  • Increase speed and consistency by using reliable default models
• More accurate investment picture
  • Use engineering standards to determine total cost of equipment and bulk materials
  • Analyze results based on capital and operating costs, including utilities
• Develop an optimal process design in the shortest possible time
  • Access over 350 models in the IPE library
  • Develop and incorporate custom models for proprietary equipment, sizing, or costing

Companies worldwide have reported significant benefits with Aspen IPE. One such customer was able to optimize the process design and economics of a complex separation / distillation scheme in less than 10% of the time it took using their traditional, non-integrated engineering workflow.

To learn more, watch our on-demand webinar entitled “Develop Cost Effective Conceptual Designs with Aspen HYSYS Integrated with Aspen Icarus Process Evaluator”. Or you may e-mail us at Engineering.insights@aspentech.com.

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The 2007 Aspen Engineering Suite (AES) User Group Meetings (UGMs) were held in Houston, USA on April 10-11 and in Frankfurt, Germany on April 24-25. These premier events for AspenTech’s user community were attended by over 200 users at each location, representing a total of more than 70 companies from over 25 countries.

The UGMs included dedicated tracks for:

• Process Modeling in Chemicals (Aspen Plus and Aspen Custom Modeler)
• Process Modeling in Refining (Aspen HYSYS and Aspen RefSYS)
• Process Modeling in Exploration & Production (Aspen HYSYS and Aspen HYSYS Upstream)
• Heat Exchanger Design & Rating (Aspen HTFS+ and Aspen B-JAC)
• Economic Evaluation (Aspen Icarus product family)
• Integrated Engineering (Aspen Zyqad)

Over 35 customers at each event shared their successes using AspenTech’s process engineering solutions. These customers included a number of highly respected companies in their industry:

The attendees also had a first-hand view of product roadmaps and future development plans, and viewed demonstrations of the powerful new capabilities in the aspenONE 2006 release.

A unique opportunity was missed by those who did not attend! But you won’t have to wait too long for the next opportunity. The next UGMs are planned for Spring 2008 in North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific. More details will be announced soon. Start planning now to attend and share your unique success stories. Please submit a user perspective at Engineering.Insights@aspentech.com for our next newsletter issue.

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Every three months, AspenTech invites customers to participate in a Voice of the Customer survey to provide feedback on products, customer support & training, professional services, and other areas of the company. In the most recent survey, customers were also polled about their most important business goals in various areas.

AspenTech’s process engineering customers worldwide responded to this survey and results show that their top goals in the next six months are:

We are pleased that these priorities are fully aligned with the capabilities available within aspenONE Process Engineering, and AspenTech continues to invest heavily in research and product development to bring new innovations to the market. Refer to the Events section of this newsletter often for seminars (live and recorded) and training events that will help you fully meet your business goals.

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Thousands of engineers are already taking advantage of Aspen Simulation Workbook™ (ASW) to integrate their simulation models into Microsoft® Excel, delivering the power of process modeling into the hands of casual users in the plant. With the release of V2006 last December, the power of ASW is now extended to dynamic simulation!

ASW now supports integration with Aspen Dynamics™, Aspen Custom Modeler®, and related products such as Aspen ADSIM™ and Aspen Chromatography™. The next release (V2006.5), due out later this year, will further extend ASW to support dynamic models built using Aspen HYSYS Dynamics® and Aspen RefSYS™.

New ASW features in V2006 include:

• Extension of the ASW toolbar allows you to select the run mode (initialization, dynamic, steady-state, etc.) with a single click from the toolbar
• New ‘step’, ‘pause’, and ‘rewind’ buttons allow you to control the simulation within Excel
• Using the ASW interface author, you can place check-boxes or buttons onto the Excel sheet to allow the model end-users to activate and deactivate tasks or launch scripts; these options allow the end-user to specify batch recipes, transition strategies or other dynamic operating policies
• Model results shown in ASW tables are continuously updated during dynamic runs
• Users can also change inputs on the fly
• A new “profile table” feature allows you to create time-profile tables, which in turn can be linked to Excel plots for creating dynamic strip charts

With ASW, dynamic models can be deployed to a wider group of potential users. This enables you to leverage your existing simulation models in innovative new ways. For example, by linking a dynamic model with process data, operators and engineers can run ‘look-ahead’ simulations to help guide operating decisions. Share your innovative uses of ASW by sending an e-mail to AspenSimulationWorkbook@aspentech.com.

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KPIC is a leader in Korea’s petrochemical industry. The company operates verticalized facilities that can handle all petrochemical production processes – from naphtha cracking to synthetic resin production – producing a wide range of petrochemicals for worldwide distribution. This article describes the successful revamp of one of their major ethylene plants. The approach used has since been applied to several other ethylene plant revamp projects, with significant economic benefits.

KPIC used an innovative approach for this project. In collaboration with AspenTech and various equipment vendors, all parties worked together during the feasibility study to change the original design and establish new process operating conditions. The goal was to avoid replacement of expensive plant equipment such as ethylene and propylene refrigeration compressors and their turbine drives. This integrated approach to process design, equipment design, and operating changes proved to greatly enhance the overall project economics and feasibility.

Using AspenTech’s process engineering solutions, the team began with a simulation model of the plant and then performed pinch analysis (process-heat integration study) and an equipment performance analysis. The end result enabled the project teams to optimize plant operating conditions and determine the best investment options for increasing production capacity and meeting energy reduction targets. KPIC is very pleased with the economic success of this project. Total benefits are confirmed at over US$16 million per year with a payback of less than 16 months.

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We have exciting news to share with you regarding AspenTech’s University Program.

• Online Enrollment and Renewal: You can now enroll into the University Program or renew your university licenses online. The process is quick and easy. Once your online request is authorized, we’ll send you the executable license with payment options so you can receive your software as soon as possible.
• New, Comprehensive Packages: We’ve combined our prior offerings into three simple yet comprehensive packages for Process Engineering, Plant Operations and Supply Chain Operations. Visit the University Program site to view a list of products for each package. Process Engineering is our most popular package, and included is a network license for up to 150 simultaneous users, live support for installation and license key issues, and access to our award-winning Knowledge Base through the support website.
• Access to Information: In addition to product support through our Knowledge Base, you can receive insightful tips via our interactive webinar series. Recordings of past events are also available via our on-demand webinars.

We appreciate the opportunity to help you educate students on how to solve real-world problems using AspenTech software. We look forward to supporting your future educational and research endeavors through our University Program!

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Tips & Tricks Available for registered web support users. New members, register here.

Aspen HYSYS

Aspen Plus

Aspen ICARUS Suite

Do you have any tips and tricks to share? Please submit your best tips at Engineering.Insights@aspentech.com and you may win a prize for the best submission!

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