gPROMS® Utilities Advisor and Planner are components of PSE’s gPROMS Operational Excellence Solutions for managing and optimizing utilities operation.
They provide a means for refineries and chemical plants to optimize on-site production and distribution of energy to minimize cost and emissions.
The challenge…
The diagram shows a typical utilities setup for a large chemicals plant site.
Plants consume fuels, electricity and steam in time-varying quantities, and via multiple routes. The process plants themselves can generate steam and fuels, electricity can be sold to the grid and the prices of the various components can change hourly. Added to this complexity are day-to-day changes in major equipment availability.
There is significant pressure on site managers to reduce energy cost and emissions, a challenging task given the large number of degrees of freedom.
The gPROMS Utilities solution
gPROMS Utilities finds a way through the maze by applying rigorous optimization technology to process models of the utility system, taking into account demands, prices and availability, to find the economically optimal operating profile for any situation.
State-of-the-art optimization algorithms deliver higher cost reductions than current tools, while fast execution speed allows a larger number of scenarios to be considered, increasing the effectiveness of energy management teams.
Modes
gPROMS Utilities provides different views for different people, depending on the task at hand:
Offline operation
ENGINEER
Create and test models of utility production and distribution within a flowsheet environment; validate models and perform what-if scenario analyses.
PLANNER
Plan optimal site management over short, medium and long term horizons, taking into account anticipated demands.
Online operation
MONITOR
Continuously validate and reconcile plant readings. Quickly identify faulty tags, mass imbalance, measurement errors, and overall confidence in site measurements.
ADVISOR
Continuously calculate and display advice for optimizing current operation, comparing hourly cost savings of minor, moderate and major changes against the current situation.
Benefits
gPROMS Utilities provides benefits at all levels:
For Operations and Planning…
- Optimum equipment on/off decisions
- Optimum equipment load allocation (exploit differences in efficiency)
- Reduced off gas flaring/steam venting
- Ability to establish optimum operation fast (also after changes in utility loads or plant upsets)
For Management…
- Utilities contract management
- Maximize benefits from negotiating ‘special conditions’ for utility contracts
- Effective equipment maintenance by improved performance monitoring
Supply and implementation
gPROMS Utilities is simple to implement and operate. PSE’s Operational Excellence Solutions implementation team will assess site requirements in terms of functionality and users, and work with your Operations and Planning teams to build an implementation.
Unlike other solutions in the market, maintenance is simple and can be handled by existing site personnel without the need to recruit specialists.
