CASFER Introduces Digital Twin Platform for Simulating a Circular Economy for Nitrogen
Outcome/Accomplishment
Innovators at the National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded Engineering Research Center (ERC) for Advancing Sustainable and Distributed Fertilizer Production (CASFER), based at Texas Tech University, have successfully collaborated with Siemens and AVATAR to introduce Digital Twin technology for the emerging CASFER field of decarbonized nitrogen-based fertilizers. This advance provides a powerful immersive reality platform for simulation modeling and workforce training. The Digital Twin environment highlights NSF CASFER’s work to create a sustainable, circular economy for nitrogen, visualized through the immersive environment of extended reality technology.
Impact/Benefits
Immersive technology can help researchers, engineers, and decision-makers better understand complex systems and collaborate more effectively. The Digital Twin system developed at NSF CASFER allows students to gain industry-relevant experiences while expanding their educational reach beyond the physical limitations of the research testbed. By working in an interactive Digital Twin environment that represents real flowsheets and real operating conditions, students gain hands-on familiarity with the technologies, system responses, and performance indicators before entering the field.
Experiences gained in the Digital Twin system can accelerate innovation, align stakeholders, and help turn complex initiatives, such as infrastructure transformation. into action. The system dramatically speeds up experiential learning to prepare students for the complex decision-making and interventions required in professional practice. For industry partners, the ability to view process parameters virtually also enhances stakeholder engagement, de-risks deployment, and supports collaborative design.
Explanation/Background
NSF CASFER’s Digital Twin immersive reality environment was developed at Texas Tech University in collaboration with Siemens and using AVATAR’s XRcreate platform. With Digital Twin, students and professionals gain access to an integrated data-driven virtual representation of real-world entities and processes. CASFER’s Digital Twins of the sludge electrolyzer and ion-exchange units represent a one-to-one match of physical systems, synchronized with real-time and historical operational data.
The system creates an immersive, virtual environment built on integrated and synchronized systems using data that makes it possible to represent past, present, or predicted futures. This allows stakeholders to walk through the unit in virtual reality, observe how operating parameters evolve, and even test “what-if” scenarios for system scaling. By bridging digital and physical infrastructure, CASFER is pioneering a new standard in how sustainable fertilizer technologies are designed, trained on, and deployed.
For the future, CASFER is expanding its digital twin capabilities to create intelligent reactors that convert diverse waste streams into high-quality organo-mineral fertilizers with the predictability and performance of commercial fertilizers.
Location
Lubbock, Texaswebsite
Start Year
Energy and Sustainability
Energy and Smart Infrastructure
Lead Institution
Core Partners
Fact Sheet
Outcome/Accomplishment
Innovators at the National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded Engineering Research Center (ERC) for Advancing Sustainable and Distributed Fertilizer Production (CASFER), based at Texas Tech University, have successfully collaborated with Siemens and AVATAR to introduce Digital Twin technology for the emerging CASFER field of decarbonized nitrogen-based fertilizers. This advance provides a powerful immersive reality platform for simulation modeling and workforce training. The Digital Twin environment highlights NSF CASFER’s work to create a sustainable, circular economy for nitrogen, visualized through the immersive environment of extended reality technology.
Location
Lubbock, Texaswebsite
Start Year
Energy and Sustainability
Energy and Smart Infrastructure
Lead Institution
Core Partners
Fact Sheet
Impact/benefits
Immersive technology can help researchers, engineers, and decision-makers better understand complex systems and collaborate more effectively. The Digital Twin system developed at NSF CASFER allows students to gain industry-relevant experiences while expanding their educational reach beyond the physical limitations of the research testbed. By working in an interactive Digital Twin environment that represents real flowsheets and real operating conditions, students gain hands-on familiarity with the technologies, system responses, and performance indicators before entering the field.
Experiences gained in the Digital Twin system can accelerate innovation, align stakeholders, and help turn complex initiatives, such as infrastructure transformation. into action. The system dramatically speeds up experiential learning to prepare students for the complex decision-making and interventions required in professional practice. For industry partners, the ability to view process parameters virtually also enhances stakeholder engagement, de-risks deployment, and supports collaborative design.
Explanation/Background
NSF CASFER’s Digital Twin immersive reality environment was developed at Texas Tech University in collaboration with Siemens and using AVATAR’s XRcreate platform. With Digital Twin, students and professionals gain access to an integrated data-driven virtual representation of real-world entities and processes. CASFER’s Digital Twins of the sludge electrolyzer and ion-exchange units represent a one-to-one match of physical systems, synchronized with real-time and historical operational data.
The system creates an immersive, virtual environment built on integrated and synchronized systems using data that makes it possible to represent past, present, or predicted futures. This allows stakeholders to walk through the unit in virtual reality, observe how operating parameters evolve, and even test “what-if” scenarios for system scaling. By bridging digital and physical infrastructure, CASFER is pioneering a new standard in how sustainable fertilizer technologies are designed, trained on, and deployed.
For the future, CASFER is expanding its digital twin capabilities to create intelligent reactors that convert diverse waste streams into high-quality organo-mineral fertilizers with the predictability and performance of commercial fertilizers.