Tuesday, February 19, 2019

By Edward Foster


New technologies are developed every day that passes. In addition to that, new tech-based products are developed and put to commercial production by companies everyday as part of diversifying their product portfolios. New products are meant to ensure that companies continue to survive in the market and compete effectively with other newer technologies produced by rivals. However, not every idea that a company/individual comes up with is worth commercializing before adequate data has been collected about it. This is worth knowing about Pilot plants.

Before companies go into commercial production of new products or technologies, they usually need to engage in small-scale production first. This is done using a setup referred to as a pilot plant. It is a pre-commercial manufacturing system that makes use of new manufacturing technology to produce new tech-based products in small volumes. This is done mainly for learning purposes so that the knowledge that is obtained is used to design a full-scale production system and commercial commodities.

The items that emanate from pilot factories are often real and there are a number of reasons for which they can be used. To begin with, these items can serve as samples that can be employed in gauging the market. In order to do this, the sample commodities are handed to consumers in the market being targeted. The customers then give feedback that companies base on to improve the final commodity.

Besides using the samples to test the market, they can also be used for quality control. In this case, the sample products are tested by the engineers of the company to determine if it meets the required standards. These standards may be set by the government or they may be internal standards that a company intends to achieve in its products. If the sample products are found not to meet set standards, they are reengineered until they are in compliance.

Pilot plant is a term that is very relative since the plant come in various sizes. However, it is for a fact that they usually have a smaller size when compared to full-scale production plants. Scaling them down or up is possible since they are intended for learning reasons and are small too. The goals one intends to achieve usually determine how scaling is done.

Cost and simplicity required to construct pilot factories varies with respect to specific instances. There are factories that are not sophisticated to the sense that they can use the stock lab equipment to construct laboratories. Some plant, on the flip side are expensive and very large. A sophisticated pilot plant can cover a lot of space measured in square feet. Their construction may cost millions of dollars too.

Complex plants are usually custom-made and fabrication is done from process piping, equipment, and instrumentation. These kinds of plants can be used for the purposes of training personnel. Workers can then apply the knowledge they gain about the pilot plant in real life situations when working at the full-scale plant.

There are many ways in which these plants minimize risks that come from constructing large process plants. First, the use of semi-empirical methods and computer simulations are used to validate designs and assumptions. Companies therefore avoid risking money before they can be sure that a certain process can be achieved.




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