As described in the previous post, a large part of the theoretical work in chemical plants is carried out during the design phase. Technology for new plants is often reused by copying existing designs and, if necessary, resizing them.

Once the plant is handed over to Operations and Maintenance, a significant part of the process knowledge appears to remain within the design organization—at least, this has been my experience. Together with the plant, procedures are transferred: start-up, shutdown, normal operation, and emergency handling. These documents are largely static and descriptive.

Now imagine being an operator in the control room, sitting in front of the DCS. You see a schematic diagram with blinking numbers—temperatures, pressures, flows. Small lights flashing like stars in a clear night.

Like old sailors, the information available to decide your course consists of discrete points. Below you is the sea, but you cannot see anything beneath the surface—only a dark, moving mass. You must trust the stars and your experience to steer the ship in the right direction.

What if you could see beneath the surface and recognize, even roughly, the shape of the seabed? That alone would provide more confidence in choosing your direction.

This is a contradiction I have often observed in this industry. Electronics give us extraordinary precision and computational power, yet this strength is not always applied where it matters most.

Knowledge exists, but it is fragmented across departments. Operators in the control room sail by the stars, often unaware that they could, in fact, see where they are going.

The problem is not a lack of data, but the absence of a representation that turns data into shared understanding.

Everything needed to create a shareable representation of the plant already exists—yet I have rarely seen it realized in practice.