UNLOCKING VALUABLE FACILITY DATA

摘要

We have been in the Information Age for several years,yet many of the current Distributed Control Systems(DCS)at gas facilities do not allow easy access to even the most fundamental data.DCS require the use of a significant portion of a facility's data;however,most systems have closed architectures,which hamper access and use of this data.In addition,operators in virtually all gas facilities make daily rounds and record significant amounts of data.This data is usually recorded on log sheets that are stored in boxes or file cabinets without any further examination of the data.VECO USA,Inc.(VECO)and Williams,Co.have recently worked together to develop and implement various data collection and analysis tools to enhance the understanding of plant operations and economics.VECO has implemented Data Historians at several other gas processing facilities that allow the mining of both the control system and the log sheet data.These tools open up a wealth of information to all operations within the gas processing facility's company,and at the plant site as well as at corporate offices.In addition,VECO and Williams have developed and implemented various software programs that automate numerous functions.These functions include linking modeling and optimization software to live plant data,performing various calculations on the data,populating routine reports,and nominating new set points for various process controllers.Utilizing off-the-shelf tools from Microsoft(MS),VECO has worked with Williams to develop user-friendly forms that allow plant operational and lab analysis data to be entered.These forms can be accessed on standard Windowsbased networked computers(PCs)and industrial handheld devices.Systems,that provide data gathering,analysis and reporting,are not necessarily an expensive or extensive undertaking.VECO recently installed a Data Historian for Tom Brown,Inc.,Lisbon Valley,Utah,that cost approximately 30,000 using MS SQL Server,Visual Basic and Excel.An out-of-thebox system of the same magnitude would cost about 60,000.Steve Jones,the plant Engineer associated with this project,is highly pleased with having process data so easily accessible.He based his recent gas processing paper [14] on information provided from this system.The data verified the economic success of their recent Acid Gas Enrichment/Injection Facility retrofit.In summary,Williams and VECO have recently developed and implemented tools to store,access,and analyze plant data that enhance the understanding of how gas processing facilities operate.