Microcomputer applications in the electrochemical industry

The installation of two microcomputer-based control systems in a chlor-alkali plant is discussed. Georgia Pacific Corporation´s Bellingham Washington chlor-alkali plant installed two microcomputer-based control systems last year. Both applications featured the use of IBM or compatible personal computers and both substantially increased the energy efficiency and the productivity of the 22 year-old plant. The automatic demand control system improved the plant´s load factor from 95% to 99.9%. Operating experience with the cell monitoring system has been most favorable. There have been fewer outages, operator response has been positive and the target k-factor of 0.095 was achieved within the first month of operation. A further reduction in the k-factor is expected. Cell bus currents are now within 2.5% of the cell bus average.<>