Wiktionary
n. A small-scale chemical engineering facility designed to research the full-scale production of a product.
Wikipedia
A pilot plant is a small industrial system, which is operated to generate information about the behavior of the system for use in design of larger facilities. Pilot plant is a relative term in the sense that plants are typically smaller than full-scale production plants, but are built in a range of sizes. Some pilot plants are built in laboratories using stock lab equipment, while others require substantial engineering efforts, cost millions of dollars, and are custom-assembled and fabricated from process equipment, instrumentation and piping. They can also be used to train personnel for a full-scale plant. Pilot plants tend to be smaller compared to demonstration plants.
Usage examples of "pilot plant".
Tsipis had found a similar packager in Hassadar that was moving to a larger location, and had drawn Mark's attention to their abandoned facility as a possible venue for the pilot plant for bug butter products.
A parts-making facility was constructed next, followed by a parts-assembly facility, and step by step the pilot plant grew itself into a fully equipped, general-purpose factory, complete with its own control computers.
A parts-making facility was constructed next, followed by a parts-assembly facility, and step by step the pilot plant grew itself into a fully equipped, general-purpose factory, complete with its own control.
But there was machinery: the rocket-propellant factory, the pilot plant for the production of other materials, the firefly robots to do the work.