XRG Technologies is an analysis, design and consulting company specializing in fired heat transfer equipment for the refining, petrochemical and power markets. We use advanced computational technologies to provide designs that are the most efficient, environmentally friendly and reliable. Our mission is combining diverse expertise with advanced simulation tools to develop innovative combustion and heat transfer solutions that enable the industry to achieve its energy efficiency and environmental stewardship goals.http://www.xrgtechnologies.com

Manage process burner sales, engineering and project execution departments (~25 people). Reorganization of the sales, applications and engineering teams. Design and execute the process burner strategy to establish John Zink as the undisputed market and technology leader. Introduce new business ventures such as burner management systems and heater retrofits. Manage and steward innovation portfolio. Organize and participate in customer training sessions around the world on combustion equipment, refinery heaters, cracking furnaces and reformers.

Responsible for global engineering and R&D. Manage, validate and standardize engineering tools. Daily supervision of 6 - 8 process engineers. Assist sales with cost estimates and presentations at customer sites world-wide. Improve manufacturing QA and QC. Disseminate burner knowledge, design and prediction methods through training and engineering directives. Promote interdepartmental and global cooperation. Training and backup for the field service technicians. Presentations at AFRC and AIChE meetings. Subcommittee leader of the API 560 and member of API 535 committee. Participate in authoring the JZ Combustion Handbooks, JZ Burner School courses.

Furnace Specialist for the Base Chemicals Process Technology Group. Provide engineering support for the six French and Belgian ethylene plants, identification of bottlenecks, reduction of pollutant emissions and energy consumption, trouble-shooting. Focus on burner operation and maintenance. Witnessing of burner tests for revamps and new projects. Detailed cracking furnace simulations (Spyro, EFPS) to determine operating envelope, identify capacity creep potential and assess alternative cracking feeds. Furnace condition and operation assessments. Commissioning, start-up and performance test runs of new furnaces. Computational Fluid Dynamics modeling to lower emissions and optimize steam cracker yield and energy efficiency. Development of low emissions burner tip for millisecond furnaces. Testing of selective non-catalytic methods to lower furnace NOx emissions. Two patent applications. Writing of Best Practices for furnace design, startup, operation, decoking, inspection and maintenance. Team leader of the Furnace Reliability Network. Development of training modules for site engineers and operators and site engineers. Participation in Technology Exchange groups with joint venture partners in Korea and USA. Technical support for all revamp and new furnace projects. Competitive and technology watch.

Work as consulting engineer for external customers, mainly as a specialist in cracking furnace technology and combustion for ABB Lummus Global. Acquisition and management of various CFD projects in process technology. Transient CFD simulations of gas turbine blade cooling phenomena for the ICAS-GT2 project, sponsored by the EU. Special responsibility for the internal development of CFD for Process Industries.

Develop the in-house Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) competence and methods for the simulation of ethylene cracking furnaces. Burner validation testing in test furnaces. Participation in the development of next generation burner, furnace and coil technology. Modeling of combustion and pyrolysis chemistry. Client presentations during site visits, at workshops and seminars. Troubleshooting and optimization of several other types of equipment and processes using CFD in cooperation with mechanical and process departments: first and second stage styrene monomer reactors, propane dehydrogenation batch reactors, deNOx reactors, etc. Advisor for heat transfer issues in catalyst developments. Six patents awarded on ethylene furnaces and denox reactors. Management of CFD hardware and software (Fluent, Gambit).

Thermal design of fired heaters, economizers, aircoolers, shell and tubes and plate exchangers. Developed calculation methods for special types of heat transfer (non-steady conduction & convection, condensation & evaporation of non-ideal binary mixtures, single- and two-phase flow maldistribution problems etc.). Troubleshooting of heat transfer equipment in the field. Design of several computer programs for thermal rating of plate exchangers. Corresponding advisor to the HTFS Crossflow Panel. Experience with software: HTFS (M-ACOL, M-TASC, FIHR), HTRI (ST, CST), PRO/II, Mathcad, Turbo-Pascal, Excel, proprietary Lummus programs.

Thermal design of air cooled heat exchangers, shell and tubes and economizers. Developed calculation methods for special types of heat transfer (e.g. natural convection, batch processes). Designed several computer programs for the thermal rating of cross-flow heat exchangers and shell & tubes. Software experience: HTFS (M-ACOL, M-TASC), Mathcad, Basic, Turbo-Pascal & proprietary software