Grant: Collaborative Research and Development Grants

Following the development of the diagnostic system, a solutions strategy for process improvement needs to be established. Natural questions, such as what to do after a process unit or instrument has been diagnosed to be or potentially to be problematic, have to be answered. A typical process control system consists of processes, sensors, actuators and controllers. The post-diagnosis solutions mean that one needs to find timely solutions for each problematic component, for example, to calibrate problematic sensors, develop inferential models for key variables, quantify the extent of actuator problems, re-identify the problematic process models for controller re-tuning, or determine process problems such as sands built-up in a pipe line or percentage of bitumen wasted in separation tailings. These problems can all be considered under a post-diagnosis estimation framework. Built upon our previous success in collaborative research and development projects, we are ready to carry forward the work from control system performance monitoring & diagnosis to process control improvement solutions. Under this new initiative, we will establish a novel post-diagnosis solutions strategy through dynamic estimations for process control systems. Specifically, we will endeavour to (1) maximize the use of the existing resources by assessing process data quality for parameter estimation, (2) develop an optimal design strategy for dynamic experiments, and (3) use advanced estimation techniques to determine key parameters of interest, under closed-loop operations, in the presence of irregularly sampled data and process constraints. Over the last several years, the oil industries have operated their facilities with increasing efficiency and effectiveness by leveraging Process Control and Automation Systems in their operation. This trend is expected to continue in the future with expected higher service factors and utilization. Now is the prime opportune time over the next few years to further leverage Process Control Infrastructures through advanced estimation methodologies, to be ready for the next major economic development.