SK Gas Develops World's First AI-Based 'Chemical Process Yield Prediction and Simulation System'

Leading Digital Transformation in the Chemical Industry
Successful Support for Training Data Experts
Expectations for Intellectual Property Sales and Solution Business Expansion

On the 12th, SK Gas announced that it has developed a 'Chemical Process AI Analysis System' capable of analyzing the PDH process and predicting yield using AI. The photo shows Shin Hyebin, a manager at SK Gas and the developer, inspecting the system. Photo by SK Gas

[Asia Economy Reporter Choi Seoyoon] SK Gas has succeeded in developing a ‘Chemical Process Artificial Intelligence (AI) Analysis System’.

On the 11th, SK Gas announced that it had successfully completed the development project of the ‘Chemical Process AI Analysis System,’ which can analyze the PDH process and predict yield using AI, and applied it to its subsidiary SK Advanced. This is the first time in the world that a system capable of yield prediction and simulation in chemical processes has been developed based on AI.

This project was initiated with the goal of optimizing the PDH process by making more efficient decisions based on an AI- and data-driven system, addressing concerns about chemical process tasks that were previously based on experience and Excel work.

To solve these problems, SK Gas developed three systems: ▲ Yield Prediction Simulator (world’s first development) ▲ Engineer Analysis Tool ▲ Anomaly Cause Analysis System using XAI (Explainable AI, a technology that provides human-understandable reasoning for AI decisions). The combined ‘Chemical Process AI Analysis System’ can be defined as a system that derives insights through correlation analysis of various factors affecting chemical processes and provides future predictive simulations for process efficiency optimization.

These achievements are the result of SK Gas’s continuous efforts in digital transformation (DX) and nurturing talent in data science convergence. Last year, SK Gas operated a CDS (Citizen Data Scientist) training course to cultivate practitioners with data analysis and processing capabilities. This six-month program aimed to foster talent who can lead innovation in work methods by applying data utilization knowledge to their tasks based on their field expertise. Among them, employees with excellent performance were further supported to complete a nine-week machine learning expert course at Seoul National University, enabling them to become data science experts. This program’s success has been recognized, and collaboration is underway at the holding company SK Discovery level to expand it to affiliated subsidiaries.

Going forward, SK Gas plans to enter the new business area of process solutions using the ‘Chemical Process AI Analysis System’ and expand its business scope through intellectual property sales. As a world-first technology, it is expected that solutions can be sold to domestic and international PDH processes. SK Gas has already completed the intellectual property registration of the ‘Chemical Process AI Analysis System’ by filing four domestic patents and two overseas patents, and is proceeding with additional overseas patent applications, making intellectual property sales possible.

An SK Gas official said, “We have consistently strived for digital transformation not just to ‘Save Money’ but to ‘Make Money’ by creating new value and business impact,” adding, “We will continue to create a new paradigm in the energy and chemical industries by nurturing diverse convergence talents.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.