Decision-Based Approach to Plantwide Control Structure Synthesis

• Published in: Industrial & engineering chemistry research Vol. 42; no. 20; pp. 4586 - 4598
• Main Authors: Vasbinder, E. M, Hoo, K. A
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Washington, DC American Chemical Society 01.10.2003
• Subjects: Applications of mathematics to chemical engineering. Modeling. Simulation. Optimization; Applied sciences; Chemical engineering; Exact sciences and technology
• ISSN: 0888-5885; 1520-5045
• DOI: 10.1021/ie021007n

The concept of plantwide control structure synthesis is not new to the chemical process industry. The approaches used can be classified into two main categories:  a process engineering approach and a mathematically oriented approach. Within each category, there is no consensus as to one approach, which is not surprising given the size, complexity, and objectives of any plant. This work describes a modular decomposition of plant flowsheets that is assessed according to a decision-based approach, the analytical hierarchical process, that consistently evaluates the merits of the decomposition among alternatives and between neighboring modules to arrive at a prioritization of objectives for each module and for the integrated plant. An example system is discussed to demonstrate the approach.