Talk:Chemical engineering/Draft

Created a new Chemical engineering article to replace one that had been deleted

This is only my second article in CZ and I consider myself to still be a newcomer. Please feel free to offer any and all constructive criticisms of this article.

In my opinion, it still needs:

• More references
• A "Timeline" subpage outlining the history of chemical engineering as a recognized discipline and profession.
• Internal links to articles devoted to other branches of engineering suc as Mechanical engineering, Civil engineering, etc. I intend to create a "Related articles" subpage and list such internal links as soon as possible.
• Start and populate a "Bibliography" subpage

If there are any other Chemical engineers in CZ, please help. - Milton Beychok 22:55, 23 January 2008 (CST)

Most of the items listed above as needed have now been done

I crossed out the above items which have now been done. - Milton Beychok 12:40, 30 January 2008 (CST)

Pre-Aprroval suggestions

Milton, it is shaping up very nicely. The History section in particular has a wonder flow to it. I was wondering if the long list of items, that repeats something like "design, operation and management" could be written in a paragraph form to remove the redundant phrases.

Some some items needing correction (in History section) "quotes note the change"
P1: However it use was not widespread --> "its" use P2: hazardous byproduct --> "the" hazardous byproduct"s"

P2?: a sentence ends with "was failed", which isn't quite correct.

Further down, change fertilisers to fertilizers? David E. Volk 09:23, 13 March 2008 (CDT)

David, I agree with all of your comments and have made the appropriate changes. Thanks for your help. Milton Beychok 10:52, 13 March 2008 (CDT)

Approval process started

Milton, I have started the approval process for you. David E. Volk 13:38, 13 March 2008 (CDT)

Haber Bosch

I definitely feel that Haber (the chemist) and Bosch (the engineer) must appear in the history of chemical engineering. Without their nitrogen binding process:

• World War I would have ended much quicker.
• World population would not be 6 billion, but considerably less.

--Paul Wormer 21:05, 13 March 2008 (CDT)

Paul, this is a paragraph excerpted from my Ammonia production article:

"The Haber process, which is the production of ammonia by combining hydrogen and nitrogen, was first patented by Fritz Haber in 1908. In 1910, Carl Bosch, while working for the German chemical company BASF, successfully commercialized the process and secured further patents. It was first used on an industrial scale by the Germans during World War I. Since then, the process has often been referred to as the Haber-Bosch process."

Would adding that paragraph be sufficient? If not, please add to it here on the Talk page and I will then work it into this article. Regards, Milton Beychok 21:51, 13 March 2008 (CDT)

Yes, and I seem to recall that Bosch was the first one who got high pressure under control on industrial size. If my memory serves me correctly--but you know that better than I--this could be added as well. And would one sentence about the history of heterogeneous catalysis not be interesting? --Paul Wormer 09:39, 14 March 2008 (CDT)

Paul, this is the paragraph I just added to the History section to cover the Haber-Bosch process and your point about high-pressure technology. As for also adding something about catalysis, I really think that heterogeneous and homogeneous catalysis deserve a separate chemistry article of their own. I don't wish the Chemical engineering article to be overwhelmed by its history section. And frankly, I don't think I have the expertise to add anything on that subject. Here is the paragraph that I added:

The Haber process for the production of ammonia by combining hydrogen and nitrogen was first patented by a chemist, Fritz Haber, in 1908. In 1910, an engineer, Carl Bosch, while working for the German chemical company BASF, successfully commercialized the process and secured further patents. It was first used on an industrial scale by the Germans during World War I. Haber and Bosch were later awarded Nobel prizes, in 1918 and 1931 respectively, for their work in overcoming the chemical and engineering problems posed by the use of large-scale high-pressure technology. Their process is often referred to as the Haber-Bosch process and is considered to be one of the major chemical engineering achievements because it made possible the large-scale production of ammonia-based fertilizers that transformed the world's food production. - Milton Beychok 15:57, 14 March 2008 (CDT)

It is a nice concise paragraph that says it all. A pity that you are not able to write a similar paragraph about catalysts (to avoid misunderstanding: I'm neither). You will agree with me that catalysts are are often of decisive importance? I will cosign the approval. --Paul Wormer 16:06, 14 March 2008 (CDT)

change of version number

Milton, as you are the principal author and I suggested approval, you are probably not supposed to change the approval version on your own. Paul could have removed the approval, and then re-approved, but the approving editors or constables are supposed to change the version number and dates. It is not a big deal, but I need to re-read the article once it is changed to see if I still approve of the changes before the url is updated. The new section is very nice and at first I thought it was already there because it seemed so familiar to me, then I realized that it came from another of your articles that I had read yesterday. The article still looks great. I changed the two dates on the metadata regarding approval. David E. Volk 18:19, 14 March 2008 (CDT)

David, I apologize for my having changed the version url. I just wanted to be sure that the approved article contained that new section that Paul asked me to include. I wasn't aware that I shouldn't change the url. Again, I apologize. Milton Beychok 22:33, 14 March 2008 (CDT)

No problem. :) David E. Volk 13:19, 15 March 2008 (CDT)

APPROVED Version 1.0

Discussion for Version 1.0 stopped here. Please continue further discussion under this break.

Next Version Discussion

I am not sure that I agree with the opening lines about chemical engineering being based on mathematics; it is more a "practical science" base (no prejudice intended) and mathematics is more a "pure" science base (like chemistry). While majoring in ChE feels almost like majoring in math as you're going through, there is much more time spent on chemistry, engineering, and the practical applications of engineering to chemical processes and physical changes and transitions. Karl D. Schubert 16:10, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Karl, do you not think that the rest of opening introductory section includes what you feel is needed? If not, would you suggest here on the Talk page how you would revise the opening lines? Then we can discuss it. Regards, Milton Beychok 21:16, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

I fixed up that opening mini-paragraph to include engineering "knowledge and concepts" in addition to math and the basic sciences in this draft. The reason I did this is to include such engineering "knowledge and/or concepts" as engineering drawing including CAD/CAM, process design and optimization and control, engineering economics, calculations such as modeling and simulations, and possibly certain aspects of industrial engineering such as scheduling and project management. These engineering aspects are not traditionally covered under basic sciences like chemistry, physics, or biology. I was tempted to include material science as one of the sciences, but I did not yet do so because a combination of chemistry and physics could cover material science, although many chemists and physicists are not particularly interested in material science and it seems to have practically become a smaller branch of science on its own. Certain concepts in mechanics are relevant to chemical engineering, which could fall under physics, but physicists let mechanical engineers handle much of mechanics.

I suppose now what happens is that I have to wait until the experts approve the edit for it to be included in the approved article version. OK, I'll wait.  :-) Henry A. Padleckas 09:44, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

Henry, what happens now is probably a long wait. For your change to be included in the approved version, it will have to be nominated for re-approval by either an Engineering, Chemistry or Biology editor. I am an Engineering editor, but since I wrote the article, I cannot nominate it for re-approval. Once it is nominated, then another editor must also join in the nomination. Since we have so few Engineering, Chemistry or Biology editors, it may be a long time before the article is nominated for re-approval. I might also add that it usually takes a fairly important change of content, addition of new content or correction of an important error before anyone will nominate it for re-approval. I don't think that the few words which you added fall into that category.

Anyhow, thanks for your edit, it is helpful. Milton Beychok 17:08, 4 December 2009 (UTC)