Operational Safety via Model Predictive Control: The Torrance Refinery Accident Revisited

Publication date: Available online 12 July 2019Source: Chemical Engineering Research and DesignAuthor(s): Zhihao Zhang, Zhe Wu, David Rincon, Panagiotis D. ChristofidesAbstractAn accidental explosion at the refinery operated by ExxonMobil in Torrance, California occurred in 2015 during operation at the Safe Park mode via the operations and integrity management system (OIMS) is analyzed in this work, and a control-based approach is presented for how the accident could have been potentially avoided. Specifically, this work reproduces and tackles the accident in Torrance, California in 2015 by dynamical modeling of the fluid catalytic cracking (FCC) unit that played a key role during the accident using information extracted from the final investigation report. A model predictive controller with an offset-free mechanism is proposed and is applied to the process under two different scenarios. The first scenario is based directly on the accident in the report in Torrance, California in 2015, while the second scenario is another potentially catastrophic situation that could have occurred. The obtained results in Aspen Plus Dynamics demonstrate that the proposed safety-aware control system is able to avoid the accident under both scenarios.

Source: Chemical Engineering Research and Design - July 13, 2019 Category: Chemistry Source Type: research