Topic 2: Employing assumptions to simplify systems

Fermi estimates
Whilst we aim for exactitude and certainties in Chemical Engineering, we often face
circumstances in which these cannot be attained. This can be due to:
A low budget
Unmeasurable quantities
Lack of space
Lack of time
Lack of expertise
Lack of available equipment
The list goes on. To tackle these issues, the use of Fermi estimates can prove to be a handy
solution. Not only do they save us time, but they also allow us to work with very little
information and many unknowns. This can be particularly useful in situations where available
data is scarce (due to, for example, the explored field being relatively new) but a prediction is
required.

Fermi Estimation for Hazard Analysis in Chemical Engineering

The regulations for chemical factories in Country X require for two safety protocols to be
used when workers are handling a new Chemical Y, depending on the number of spills per
year. Protocol 1 is required in required in factories where a spillage anywhere in the factory
occurs 10 or less times every year; Protocol 2 is used otherwise. Factory Z is the first
factory of this new chemical in Country X, and the Health Ministry wishes to determine
which protocol it should be following upon opening, as it has not collected any statistics
regarding the manufacture of this chemical yet.
The factory is a medium-sized factory and safety regulations allow workers handling
Chemical Y to do so for around 50% of their workday. The factory opens year-round.
Which protocol should Factory Z be using?
Solution
We begin to perform estimations of the unknowns: the number of workers, the number of
working hours, the number of working days and the number of working hours occurring
between spills per worker (there are many other ways to tackle this problem).
Because it is a medium-sized factory, we will assume the number of workers is in an
order of magnitude of 2. So there are 100 workers.
Assuming a worker works 200 days a year, 10 hours a day: 2000 hours a year.
Since there are 100 workers, a total 200000 hours of work a year are done in the
factory when adding individual workers hours.
Workers handle Chemical Y for 50% of their working time. So, 100000 hours of work
a year are done handling Chemical Y
It is estimated that a spill occurs every 1000 hours per worker.
There are there 100000/1000 = 100 spills a year
There are, of course, many other factors which could be included: do all spills account for
the same security hazard? Does the stage of manufacture and processing of Chemical Y
affect how unsafe it is considered to be? Do all employees work the same hours or are some
part-time to compensate for the employees going on holidays and taking days off?
The Fermi estimates balance these factors out in over and underestimates. 100 is larger
than 10 by an order of magnitude. Whilst Fermi estimates tend to be within an order of
magnitude of the true value (implying the true value could actually be much nearer to 10),
safety regulations will always balance towards the more secure option. Hence, we can
confidently say Protocol 2 is the one Factory Y should be using.

Dimensional Analysis for Scale-up in Chemical Engineering

Testing is a fundamental aspect of engineering: it is simply unfeasible to build projects
without first developing its prototypes. These are then used to explore which aspects of that
being built have to be modified to yield an optimum final design. Amongst the many
reasons for doing this lie the huge financial risks that would be taken if we built our ideas
without testing them first.
But how do we then turn a prototype into a full-scale, functioning model? The answer lies in
scale-up. Through the use of dimensional analysis, we find what are called dimensionless
groups (you will explore these further in your second term). These dimensionless groups
ensure that, when scaling-up a prototype into a model, physical similarity is maintained
between these so that the final models results, although scaled-up, can be predicted. These
physical similarities include:

Chemical similarities
Kinematic similarities
Dynamic similarities
Thermal similarities
Geometric similarities.

These similar identities are required for us to be able to define the two models by the same
equations.
You will often hear the role of a chemical engineer in industry is to turn what a chemist or a
pharmacist produces in a lab into a full-scale production process. So, if a chemist produces
a pill in a lab in 3 hours, how can a chemical engineer produce several hundreds of times as
many in the same allocated time without compromising the products quality? Dimensionless
groups help us in this scale-up.

Scale-up for heat transfer in pipes

A chemical engineer develops a small
prototype for a piping system to transport oil
from an offshore refinery to an onshore site
where the oil will be further processed. This
prototype will be used to measure values
such as heat losses and pressure drops.
Through the use of dimensionless groups, it
is ensured that the ratios of these values are
everywhere the same when scaling-up into the
model.
The Nusselt number, which you will explore
in further detail throughout the second term, is
used to ensure physical similarity in the ratio

of total heat transfer to conductive heat transfer. It is given by the equation: =

;

where Nu is the Nusselt number, h is the convective heat transfer coefficient, L is the
length of the pipe and k is the fluids thermal conductivity. Numbers such as this are given a
name because they appear so often. Other famous numbers include the Reynolds and the
Prandtl number.
The chemical engineer would proceed to use this number, which is to be constant, when
considering heat transfer in the scale-up.

Applied Dimensional Analysis and Modelling by Thomas Szirtes (page 126: problem 6.5;
page 327: solved example)

1. A ball dropped in still air achieves a terminal velocity , which is the

function of the balls radius R, density , and gravitational acceleration
(considered constant). Hence, the following formula is given:
= . 1 . 2 . 3

Where the units of k are 1.5 . 1.5 in SI. Assuming this formula is
homogenous, determine the n exponents.

Solution
We know that the units on both sides of the equation must be equal so:

. 1

( 1.5 . 1.5 )

1
( 2 )

2 2
( 3) 2 ( 2)

For m: 1 = 1.5 + (0.5) . 1 (1.5). 2 + (0.5). 3

For kg: 0 = 0.5 + (0.5). 2
For s: 1 = 3

Why we did this? Imagine youre developing a relation and you come up with a formula or
youre stuck in an exam and trying to remember a formula. How would you know if your
equation is correct? You simply check the homogeneity as we did in this question.

2. The elastic foundation is represented by a spring with the constant k. The

spring rests on immovable ground and the movement of the mass (m) before it
reaches the spring is only governed by gravity, h is the height from which it falls,
and the mass is falling straight on the spring with their centres of masses
aligned. Hence the compression of the spring (x) is dependent on the following
variables:
= (, , , )
Using the Buckingham Pi theorem, reconstruct a relation that results in only
dimensionless groups. Show your repeating variables and the Pi groups.

Solution
Number of dimensions: 3 (M, L, T)
Number of variables: 5 (, , , , )

Hence 5-3=2 dimensionless groups

Repeating variables: , ,

Through dimensional analysis, the Pi groups are found to be: 1 =

.
.

2 =

.
.

1 = (2 )
.
.
= (
)
.
.

Why are dimensionless groups important? Why did we do everything that we did?
When we want to experiment and test these relations in reality, we need to change every
variable while keeping the rest constant and move from one variable to the other. As you can
imagine, when we have more than a few dependent variables it could be almost impossible
to do this. Even if possible, the process would take a very long time and with each
experiment we would be increasing the inaccuracy of our results. Thus, using dimensionless
groups we can reduce the number of experiments that we do. This is because we would be
dealing with less dimensionless groups than variables. In this case we reduced the variables
from 5 to only 2 dimensionless groups. That would reduce the number of graphs we need to
draw from 64 to only 1!