Yokogawa, via its French subsidiary, has been chosen to supply the control solutions for Seqens' future paracetamol production unit in Roussillon. It is a site that the Japanese group knows well. Its technology is already being used to manage the production of salicylic acid. In fact, in the future the production processes for these two analgesic active ingredients will be managed in the same room.
The Roussillon chemical platform in Isère is gearing up for a significant industrial event with the relocation of paracetamol production. The issue is one of health sovereignty, as this active ingredient, which came under considerable pressure during the health crisis, has not been produced in France, or even in Europe, since 2008.
The proposal to relocate comes from the French group Seqens, which is already a global player in the paracetamol sector with two units in China. It took the company a year of research and development before it was in a position to propose a more innovative, competitive and environmentally friendly process.
In 2021, the project was formalized and received the support of the France 2030 program. The unit, which will have an annual capacity of 15,000 tonnes of paracetamol and is scheduled to come on stream at the end of 2025, is currently under construction.
Among the equipment manufacturers taking part in this project, known as Phoenix 15KT, is the Japanese group Yokogawa, via its subsidiary Yokogawa France.
A global solution to manage the new unit
A specialist in instrumentation and control systems, Yokogawa was awarded a contract last year to supply the “systems package”. To this end, the French subsidiary will provide a comprehensive solution for managing the new unit, comprising a distributed control system (Centum VP), a safety instrumented system (ProSafe-RS), and a plant historian suite to ensure facility management, reporting, and production traceability (Exaquantum). At the same time, the Japanese giant’s PRM (Plant Resource Manager) solution will be deployed to manage the plant’s instruments, although the equipment manufacturers have not yet been selected. This PRM solution facilitates calibration and maintenance of the instruments by enabling, for example, self-diagnosis and centralized information.
Yann Malry, Managing Director of Yokogawa France, describes it as an “important” project for his subsidiary. The project will be rolled out over several years, with operations launched in April 2023. To give an idea of its size, he cites hundreds of inputs/ outputs to be managed in the control systems.
A long-standing presence at the Les-Roches- Roussillon chemical platform
Yokogawa has a number of strengths, that have allowed it to stand out from the competition and to win this “systems package”, starting with its long-standing presence at the heart of the Les- Roches-Roussillon chemical platform, at various end customers such as Seqens, where Yokogawa France's instruments, systems, solutions and services are present in large numbers.
Ultimately, a complete solution from Yokogawa France will control three production units, including continuous and batch processes – salicylic acid production – and paracetamol production. And all in the same control room. Seqens’ isopropanol production will continue to be managed separately at the same Roussillon site.
“For Seqens, the paracetamol project is an opportunity to update the long-term automation strategy for operational units, for both current and future projects”, commented Léonard Jacquemet, Project Manager at Seqens. “The practical feedback provided by the production teams, the reliability of the solutions used, the responsiveness of and proximity to maintenance, combined with the enthusiasm of the Yokogawa France teams for the project, has convinced Seqens to create a long-term partnership at the Roussillon platform by selecting Yokogawa to build the distributed control system for the new paracetamol unit”, he added.
The advantage of geographical proximity
Fabrice Magat cites other advantages such as the geographical proximity of Yokogawa France to the chemical platform in Roussillon. The subsidiary has workshops in Vélizy-Villacoublay (Yvelines), as well as in Lyon (Rhône), where all the DCSs delivered to Roussillon will be assembled and programmed.
“The fact that our teams have a local presence means that we can manufacture cabinets on site, develop systems applications in our Lyon branch, support our customers with unrivaled local responsiveness, and create and maintain a genuine partnership guaranteeing service, maintenance and knowledge and skills management. This combination is one of our strengths and has convinced our customers in this region of France”, comments Fabrice Magat.
Furthermore, all of the equipment will be installed and the new unit commissioned within the existing control room, without any production stoppages or disruption to ongoing production. Finally, the solutions proposed by Yokogawa have the advantage of being modular.
“So far, we've been talking about process control. But in the future, we could envisage adding further technological building blocks with process optimization or energy management solutions featuring the most efficient possible energy mixes”, adds Yann Malry.
Separate “instrumentation” and “system” packages
Fabrice Magat also addressed the separate “instrumentation package” (thus far not launched) being separate from the “system package”.
Here again, Yokogawa should be able to position itself, since it has a wide range of field instruments, including flowmetry, pressure and temperature measurement, data recording and acquisition tools, physicochemical analyzers, and advanced analyzers.
Yokogawa is one of a number of equipment manufacturers that have chosen to combine systems and instrumentation in their portfolio, whilst other manufacturers have opted to be pure players in each of these segments.
