(576a) Introductory Comments for Thermodynamics Needs of Chemical Industry

Background – A lack of industrial- academic interactions in the area of thermodynamics has been noticed by several academic researchers as well as industrial practitioners.  This could have a long term impact on the future of thermodynamics research and lead to a lack of improved models and good quality data in the future. Europe is seeing a lot of industrial-academic interactions through the Working Party on Thermodynamics and Transport Properties (WP-TTP).  This forum seeks to fill this interactions gap for North America based thermodynamics researchers and is open to others as well.

Purpose – Provide a forum for interactions between academic researchers and industrial practitioners so as to

(a) help increase the academic understanding of industrial practices and applications,

(b) help industrial practitioners understand the current activities and future trends in thermodynamics research,

(c) increase common basis of thinking, synergy, and possible technical collaborations between these two groups

(d) help increase industrial applicability of research activities in applied thermodynamics,

(e) provide a forum for industrial practitioners to share examples of important applications of thermodynamics for chemical processes, interesting cases of property behavior, and important classes of pure components and mixtures etc.

(f) encourage research in an important traditional area of chemical engineering. 

(g) help identify and disseminate research gaps related to thermodynamics. 

(h) help bring important areas of research to the notice of funding agencies.

These introductory comments are intended to put the upcoming presentations into perspective as the audience prepares for a panel discussion designed to identify industrial research topics in thermodynamics that require intensified academic research.