APPLICATION OF DATA RECONCILIATION TO AN ATMOSPHERIC CRUDE UNIT TO CALIBRATE INSTRUMENTS
Fernandes, N.F.
Abstract:
Traditionally, data reconciliation has been used to obtain more accurate estimates of plant measurements. The accuracy is assumed to be improved by taking more information into account, ie additional measurements and knowledge of the process. Mass balance reconciliation has been used to get a consistent set of mass flow rates. Plant-wide material balance in oil refineries are providing an accurate representation of the interconnectivity of the entire plant complex and resolving and reconciling data discrepancies associated with plant operating data sources. The process of reconciliation is often an inexact and arduous task. Meters measure within tolerances, measure volume not mass, and often do not measure all the material movement in the plant. The task of reconciliation, then, becomes one of surmising the missing flows and determining where the errors are in the measurement system. Process data are generally corrupted by gross measurement errors. Using data reconciliation of process data we can use the operational performance of field instrumentation and plot calibration curves and the problematic instruments can be determined. Ploting reconciliation vs measured data we can produce a reliable mass balance for the distillation crude unit.
