A Process Engineering Virtual Teaching Environment

1 Ming T. Tham, Dept. of Chemical and Process Engineering, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 7RU, England, [email protected] 2 Richard W. Jones, School of Engineering, University of Northumbria, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 8ST, England. [email protected] Abstract Process Control is acknowledged to be the technology that has the greatest potential for improving competitiveness in the process industries. Although Chemical/Process Engineers are the natural personnel to carry out Process Control functions, as undergraduates, they often view Process Control to be a subject full of abstract concepts with high mathematical content and hence difficult; and that Process Control is non-mainstream Chemical Engineering. Many are therefore put off by Process Control at an early stage. Laboratories are traditionally used to mitigate this situation, and more recently, computer delivered interactive content have also been reported to be an useful tool in Process Control education. However, both have, up to now, been used as separate teaching tools. This paper proposes a framework whereby the two approaches can be integrated into a Process Engineering virtual teaching environment. Technical and implementation issues are also discussed.