Over 75% of all industrial material feedstock are particulates in nature. These particle systems regularly display undesirable and unpredictable behaviour, due to their multi-scale nature from discrete particles and their contacts to large scale industrial processes. Industrial surveys have reported that almost 10% of global energy is wasted because 40% of the capacity of industrial plants is lost due to undesired and misunderstood particle phenomena. Often-encountered challenges include failure of equipment, such as the bridging and jamming of flows in silos, segregation/mixing issues in multi-ingredient products, caking or clumping in cohesive powders, and deterioration of particulate product quality. Addressing these problems is important in a vast range of industrial sectors, ranging from minerals, agriculture and food processing to plastics, consumer and personal care products, pharmaceutics and the environment: all vital to future wealth creation, health and environmental sustainability. The micro-to-macro link is a major obstacle due to a significant gap in the knowledge to understand the phenomena and the methods to deal with the spatial and temporal length scales present in these particle processes. A better understanding of upscaling will bridge the gap, leading to improved designs and optimisation of particulate processes and products.
TUSAIL will train 15 Early Stage Researchers (ESRs) to become creative, entrepreneurial and innovative individuals in developing, applying and validating three novel modelling methodologies in the upscaling of industrial particulate processes. The validated upscaling methodologies will not only increase flexibility and adaptability of industry, but also accelerate technology adoption and thus significantly advance the competitiveness and innovation capacity of European industry.
TUSAIL will have a immediate and long-term impact on Europe, strengthening the ESRs’ career perspectives, boosting EU industry and benefiting society. Training in these novel technologies for upscaling of particulate processes will support meeting critical needs in the design and operation of particulate processes in manufacturing. We will address the lack of well-trained IT experts in this field to support the EU's Digital Skills Strategy. The market for particulate products is considerable in the EU and estimated to be ~£1,000 billion per year in emerging overseas markets. Handling of these particulate systems is therefore hugely significant across many EU industrial sectors. TUSAIL will give a competitive edge to European companies by training R&D staff capable of addressing a critical unmet need, thus contributing to future productivity and growth.
TUSAIL will also have a real societal and environmental impact by providing innovative effective solutions to reduce industrial wastage and minimize energy consumption, e.g. milling is less than 10% energy efficient and uses 5% of global energy. TUSAIL will therefore contribute towards the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.
