Annual General Meeting 2005

On February 17, 2005, using a set of slides, DOW (represented by Werner MERK), TOTAL (represented by Michel PONS) and IFP (represented by Bertrand BRAUNSCHWEIG) teamed up to present several reports to the CO-LaN members assembled in Como, Italy.

First W. MERK described CO-LaN activities in 2004, then the status report was approved by the Full Members present or represented.

At the end of 2004, CO-LaN counted 7 Full Members and 31 Associate Members with Carnegie Mellon University, Universita Politehnica of Bucharest, University of Valladolid, ProTechSoft Systems and NETL as new Members. CO-LaN was also proud to receive endorsements from the CAPE Working Party of the European Federation of Chemical Engineering, from the CAPE Working Party of the Société Française de Génie des Procédés, from the European Group of Aspentech Users and from VDI-GVC.

W. MERK announced that the CO-LaN website hosting service has been awarded to TopConcepts GmbH and that a Consultancy Contract has been signed with Aspentech for the next two years. CO-LaN was grateful to the Associate Members making available licenses of their software products: AspenTech, ProSim SA, TUV-NEL, Process Systems Enterprise, Infochem, Simsci-ESSCOR, RSI. W. MERK outlined the Consultancy Service Scheme proposed by CO-LaN to any Member with four consultants approved. Already four consultancy actions have been successfully conducted. As in the past years, a number of dissemination actions have been organized at international conferences or at user meetings.The 1st US CAPE-OPEN meeting has been held in Cincinatti thanks to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Next M. PONS as representative of TOTAL acting as Treasurer of CO-LaN till the end of 2004, presented the financial report for 2004 which was approved by the Full Members present or represented. The financial health of CO-LaN is good with expenditures less than revenues and accumulated funds in excess of 120 K€, giving CO-LaN the means to conduct its upcoming actions.

Then, B. BRAUNSCHWEIG outlined the proposed actions for 2005 and the corresponding budget for 2005. This proposed budget was approved by the Full Members present or represented. The development of support tools such as testers and loggers was listed among the priorities along with polishing and finalizing interface specification notably through the development of prototypes.

Finally a new Management Board was elected with Dow, represented by W. MERK, as President, with BP, represented by P. BANKS, as Secretary, with IFP, represented by B. BRAUNSCHWEIG, as Treasurer and with TOTAL (represented by J. BOUSQUET), BASF (represented by R.A. KLEIN) and Shell Global Solutions (represented by R. DICKINSON) as Members.