SOMCHE 2009 - INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON CHEMICAL AND BIOPROCESS ENGINEERING (ICCBPE-2009)

SOMCHE 2009, which will be in August, will be organized by Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS). It is an annual event not to be missed by national chemical engineers.

Objectives of this event are:
- To share findings on advanced product design, development and recovery for natural resources.
- To produce a conference proceeding that can be a reference to the students and researchers.
- To serve as a forum for industries and researchers to exchange ideas.

Theme:
Advanced product design, development and recovery for natural resources.

Introduction

The technologies of chemical and bioprocess engineering are now a days moving at a tremendous pace by offering new features and performance improvement in chemical industries. Competition between manufacturers and a universal recognition of the need for research and development are the reasons for the fast movement in the current technology. Process is being made in understanding process performance and also in the rapid development of bio-products for the new frontier products. Realizing the importance of the win-win situation, 23^rd Symposium of Malaysian Chemical Engineers (SOMChE) 2009 in conjection with the 3 rd International Conference on Chemical and Bioprocess Engineering (ICCBPE-2009) will be organized by School of engineering and information technology, Universiti Malaysia Sabah.

23rd Symposium of Malaysian Chemical Engineers (SOMCHE) 2009

in conjunction with

3rd International Conference on chemical and Bioprocess Engineering (ICCBPE)

ORGANIZER:
Chemical Engineering Programme, School Of Engineering & Information Technology, UNIVERSITI MALAYSIA SABAH, 88999 KOTA KINABALU SABAH,MALAYSIA

CO-ORGANISER:
Centre of Materials & Minerals, School Of Engineering & Information Technology, UNIVERSITI MALAYSIA SABAH, 88999 KOTA KINABALU, SABAH, MALAYSIA

VENUE :
Sutera Harbour Golf Resort,
Kota Kinabalu, Sabah.
www.suteraharbour.com


DATE : 12^th –14^th August 2009

If you have any interesting research or ideas related to the program theme, I highly encourage you to participate in this conference. I myself, may consider to present a technical paper in the conference but I should prepare an abstract and submit it before 30th January 2009. Acceptance of abstract will be on 15th February 2009 while receipt of full paper will be expected at 31st March 2009. I'll update this post accordingly to provide more information.

For further information, please refer to the official >> website.
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Plumber Vs Plumbing Engineer - What's the Difference?

We've heard, read, seen, listen all about chemical engineering as web 2.0 evolves... Some of us knows the what is chemical engineering and chemical engineer... Some knows the differences between a chemist and a chemical engineer. If you still don't, please Google...

Well, I'm not going to blog about that, instead I want to share something else...When I surf the net just now, I came across this interesting article, "Plumber Vs Plumbing Engineer - What's the Difference?" After reading through, I thought it might be worth sharing in this blog. This article was written by D. Michael Kirby, a freelance writer who loves to share a lots of thing especially about technology. Check it out... and at the end I attached a cool video you don't want to miss... :)

The phrase "plumbing engineer" might just sound like a fancy five-dollar term to use when "plumber" sounds too pedestrian. Like, if your stodgy old eighth-grade English teacher comes to visit, and the toilet breaks, you might say something like, "Alas! It seems as though it may be time to avail myself of some of my local plumbing engineer's finest handiwork! Forsooth, and such."

Luckily, your stodgy eighth-grade English teacher didn't bring your persnickety eleventh-grade science teacher with her, because you'd be wrong.

You call a plumber to fix a broken toilet, repair a leaky pipe or unclog a stubborn drain. Plumbers are a vital component of the professional engineering community, but a plumber just is not the same as a plumbing engineer.

So what is a plumbing engineer, you ask? The easiest way to make the distinction is to think of the plumbing engineer as the guy who designs the system, and the plumber as the guy who maintains it. You'd call Jack the plumbing engineer to map out the hot and cold water system in the new home you're building; you'd call Joe the plumber to fix it when a gasket wears out.

Plumbing engineering relies on design, planning, creation and implementation. A plumbing engineer draws up a pipe system for a new building or series of buildings, makes sure every pipe connection is solid and every delivery method is efficient. He chooses the right materials to make sure the system lasts for years with minimal maintenance. If you get a top-notch plumbing engineer, you probably won't need to call the plumber very often.

The Whole Building Design Guide, an expansive web-based information resource for contractors, designers and architects, provides a good working definition of plumbing engineering:

The Plumbing Engineer is involved with systems that overlap into the mechanical, civil, and chemical engineering disciplines. The Plumbing Engineer is in a key position to influence the water efficiency, sustainable site, energy, fire protection, and pollution systems of a facility.

Plumbing engineers are qualified to oversee a wide array of public and private building projects:

• When a new shopping center needs a stormwater management system, the engineering firm designing the center would hand the job over to a plumbing engineer.
• A plumbing engineer might work closely with a fire protection engineer to to make sure a new sprinkler system is in good working order.
• An entire team of plumbing engineers might design a sewer system for a new housing development.

D. Michael Kirby is a freelance writer living in California. He writes about travel, technology, home improvement, and a plethora of other topics. One of his clients, Enerdyne Engineering, is the premier provider of plumbing engineering services -- and a whole raft of other engineering consulting services -- in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York and Delaware.

Visit Enerdyne here: http://www.enerdyneinc.com.

After reading the article, I strongly believe you want to see this interesting video clip about the perfect plumber OR is it a disastrous plumber?!!! It sounds like Irish slang...not sure...Enjoy...


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Resign Peacefully

As some of you have noticed, I have resigned from my job as a process engineer last June. Since then, I have set few targets to be achieved in my professional career as an engineer (in the academic line). Among the target is for me to be a professional engineer. I have registered with Board of Engineers Malaysia (BEM) and Institution of Engineers, Malaysia (IEM). However, after meeting my mentor last week, I was informed by him that my log book record is missing something. I did not get my previous job record verified by my superior. I need to the signature and stamp of my ex-boss. I totally missed that. All this while I thought that I only need my mentors signature and stamp.

That's fine. I need to contact my ex-boss. I have mixed feeling before contacting him. What if he decline to approve my previous job activities? I called him and he asked me to email the job record. 36 hours after that he replied my email and after a series of email, he asked me to come and meet him the following day. To cut the long story, and to make it short, I finally got my ex-boss verification and I'm very delighted. I really appreciate my ex-boss time and effort to assist and support me. Now, I need to compile and get my job record for this year and submit them to IEM.

What's the morale of the story here? Of course there are few but for me, there is one significant morale that I want to share...

If you want to resign, then resign in a good manner.

Resign peacefully. Off course I felt uncomfortable informing my ex-boss that I want to resign. However, after explaining my reasons and my ambition, he understood and respect my decision. All my friends in my previous work place were very supportive. They know that I'm going to have a better career. After leaving the company, I still continue good relationship with all levels of staff from my ex-company. I established some kind of informal collaboration with my former company and I hope it can benefit both parties.

We never know when we need a favour from them. Like me, I turned to my ex-boss and ask a favour from him. What if I resigned in bad manner? What if I resigned and my ex-boss hated me? Definitely the job record verification process will be a "mission impossible" process... Then, to solve the problem, I might do something that may not be ethical. In other words, chances for me doing a "don't" in the engineering ethics is high! Then everything will not be right. Everything will be totally wrong. We need to do it the right way everytime. We need to maintain our good reputation. Engineer need to be a reliable and trusted person, not a man with illusion. Just be honest and be good.

Leaving good reputation with your ex-company will make you special. You'll be welcomed any time you return. Isn't that great. I easily entered the company premises and various level of staffs called and waved at me. I chatted with them, asking how they are doing and other catching up talks. My fellow friends, supervisor, security guards, supervisors, technician, fitters, canteen lady etc greeted me with cheer and asked how I was doing in my new career. That's really a good feeling... What about you...? Any experience you would like to share?

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Problem: Flash Fire Problem

2 weeks ago, Professor Silveston from Waterloo University Canada came to Universiti Teknologi Malaysia for an assignment. While he was around, he gave a workshop on problem solving. It was really a very interesting workshop and we learnt how to think critically on how to solve problems (it can be any problem including chemical engineering operation problems).

I would like to share one problem that he gave us and I want to see some ideas. Please feel free to gave your opinion on the answer for the problem.

Flash Fire Problem

Heavy naphtas are converted into high octane gasoline in platformer. By products of the reaction include LPG and hydrogen rich gas containing 6-80% by volume hydrogen. The products from the platformer reactor (at 700 psig and 500 oC) are heat-exchanged with the naptha feed to the reactor. This preheats the feed. The platforming catalyst is rapidly fouled and must be generated by blowing with steam or waste gas. Thus the process is cyclic. A battery of reactors maintains a steady flow.

In three weeks since the startup, there have been four flash fires along the flanges of the heat exchanger. The plant manager claims that because of the differential expansion within the heat exchanger, because of the diameter of the exchanger and the stream hydrogen is rich these flash fires are bound to occur. The maintainance mean have broken 6 bolts trying to get the flange tighter, but they just cannot get it tight enough. The excahanger costs $200,000 and the whole plant costs #39 million. The technical manager says that the plant must be safe in 3 days.

What will you do?
What are the actions?
Can you think and share with us your action plan...

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World Congress of Chemical Engineering (WCCE8)

Have you been to Canada? I haven't. Now, here is one good reason to visit Canada next year. enjoy beautiful Canada and attend the World Congress of Chemical Engineering (WCCE8). This time it will be held in Canada.

You can now submit your technical papers and please do that before 30th November 2008. For more details on the paper format, please click here. For more information on the congress, click their official website here. I love the website. It's attractive, very informative - it contains information from the congress program up to career fair.

I'm not sure whether I'm going or not. I'm going to think what paper I can write for WCCE8. I hope I can attend the congress with my wife, present paper and do some networking.

Here's something that I picked from the official site.

Canada and Montréal will welcome the international chemical engineering community to the 8th World Congress of Chemical Engineering (WCCE8), at the downtown Palais des Congrès de Montréal, August 23 to 27, 2009. WCCE8’s technical program will emphasize the key role played by chemical engineers from all around the world in developing the processes and products needed by humanity in a more sustainable way—as highlighted in the Congress’s overall theme “Challenges for a Changing World”.

On behalf of the Organizing Committee, I look forward to welcoming you in Montréal on August 23, 2009.

Philippe A. Tanguy
Congress Chair

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What is it Like Being a Chemical Engineer?

When I was a chemical engineering student, I always wonder how a chemical engineer works. Now, it's my turn to share my experiences to the juniors and that's also one of the reason this blog is created. Today's student have better advantage on learning what chemical engineering is all about. There are websites, blogs, videos, pictures and all are easily available. Enough about that... if you are still a student and wonder who does it feel to be a chemical engineer, check out the following video showing some chemical engineers explaining how they feel being a Chemical Engineer.




The second video shows some idea on what chemical engineers do...

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Can I Learn and Master Everything?

My original ambition was to be an architect! My father, my mother and my uncle knows about this. I love sketching and drawing. I drew modern buildings, I imagined a sky scraper university and sketched too. After my secondary school, I had to made a decision whether to choose architecture or something related to chemistry. If you want to know how I develop my interest in chemistry / chemical engineering, feel free to read my about me story.

I have to choose the direction of my tertiary education (end 1993). I'm confused... Should I choose architecture or Chemical Engineering? I love them both. I want to make a career out of both of them.

Then, I made my decision. I'll study Chemical Engineering and learn Architecture (on a part time basis). The place where I studied before, Pusat Pendidikan Persediaan Institute Teknologi Mara (PPP ITM), that time, also offers architecture course on top of engineering courses. I thought I can learn architecture on my free time while being an engineering student.

Luckily, the class I was in combined 6 architecture students with the rest of the engineering students (about 25 of us). This was such a great opportunity for me because I have architecture students friends at class and at my hostel. This means I can easily learn architecture from them. Once in a while, after completing my engineering tutorial, I went to my architecture student friend apartment and browsed through their books, flipped pages, checked out his sketches and drawing. I made few drawings as well and they acknowledged my work. I was very delighted with that.

But then, as time goes by, the engineering subjects became tougher and tougher. I had to pay more attention on pure mathematics, mechanics, physics and chemistry subjects. I need to get a good grade for my A-Levels, if not, I'm not going overseas. So, there goes my architecture dream... drifting away...and away....from me. I no longer have the time to entertain my artistic desire. I have to focus and work hard on my chemical engineering degree.

I am those type of person who don't spend money for fun or leisure. My pocket money was always channel to buy books, magazine or any reading material that I'm interested in.

Well, that was about 13-14 years ago. Now the same issue emerge again.

I graduated as a chemical engineer, got a masters degree, work few years in the industry and now I'm an academician. I still have the same desire - to learn and master everything. I want to be good at almost everything. I want to be good in lecturing, research work, consultation, web 2.0., professional involvements, sports and many more. The fact is I'm just a normal human being. I need to be realistic. I can't learn everything even if I spend 24 hours a day. I have limited hours and I need to wisely manage my time to do all my activities especially the learning stuffs that interest me. I need to prioritize what I should learn.

Believe it or not, I have tonnes of ebooks. Some related to chemical engineering while the rest not related. I also have hundreds of technical paper in my hard disc. I'm not sure when i can read them. It's just too much. Short answer is I need to again - prioritize.

So the conclusions:

1. In our life, we have a lot of responsibilities and good desires.
2. We only have 24 hours a day.
3. We have to be realistic on what we want to do.
4. So, we need to prioritize our tasks. We need to focus on certain areas. Establish your own skill
and area.

I'm sorry ramble. There are too much inside my head. I want to do a lot of thing but I can't. i have to do it one at a time. If only I can duplicate myself...

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