Case Studies

  Case Studies—By Industry

  Case Studies—By Type of Result

Columbian Chemicals Improves Process & Saves Energy

	The Challenge: Reduce energy costs and improve process variability across the company. The Solution: PlantTriage installed at plants worldwide. The Results Over $1,000,000 saved. Almost immediate return on investment.
Watch the Video Case Study. (3:50 minutes, WMV)

Customer Success Story:

Kruger Paper Starts Up A Paper Machine 4 Months Early Using PlantTriage

Watch the Video Case Study. (12:06 minutes, WMV).

The Challenge:
Fast and efficient startup of new paper machine.

The Solution:
500 loop PlantTriage system.

The Result:

Solved many stability and startup problems resulting in:

• startup 4 months ahead of schedule
• 2% increase in efficiency 1 year before projected best-case startup curves. Results in an on-going savings of over 1 million dollars per year.

Profit and loss matrix:

Customer Success Story:

Smurfit-Stone saves $280,000 per year!

Smurfit-Stone Container Corporation produces paperboard/packaging products including virgin and recycled container-board, coated and uncoated recycled box-board and solid bleached sulfate and recycled cylinder-board, and consumer packaging.

The Challenge: Steam Dryers
The humidity on the dry end of a paper machine was cycling and causing high variability in the end product. The steam supply was also cycling. On the steam dryers there are 3-10 drums per section. Temperature is controlled by maintaining the pressure. Each subsequent drum has higher temperature and pressure to dry the paper further. If moisture in a section is high then you increase drum temperature to bring it back. The steam from the previous drum is re-used in the next drum to save energy.

The Solution:
ExperTune hysteresis and stiction test revealed bad response from the positioner because of hysteresis and stiction. Using ExperTune software, the service provider analyzed and diagnosed each valve, checked sizing, gain and stiction. Smurfit repaired the valve problems pinpointed by ExperTune and the service provider who then tuned the loops using ExperTune software.

The Result:
Smurfit Stone's profit increase was $280,000/year.

Profit and loss matrix:

Customer Success Story:

Petro-Canada saves over $500,000!

Offshore Oil Processing. An offshore oil field is being developed using a Floating Production Storage and Offloading vessel (FPSO). This facility is a ship-shaped vessel with integrated oil storage.

The Challenge:
A new 900 foot long ship with oil separators on the ship. The ship hooks up to the oil well, processes and offloads fuel to a tanker. This is a 3 billion dollar project that produces 100,000 barrels per day of oil. It is important to get the most out of this capital investment by getting the ship up and running quickly and out to sea. They did not want tuning to be a bottleneck in getting the ship started up. There is $3 million dollars a day in revenue from this ship.

The Solution:
Petro Canada purchased ExperTune software and trained 2 different crews in its use.

The Result:
ExperTune software conservatively saved at least 1/2 day of start-up time. It probably saved 3 days of start-up time. 4 hours of start-up time on this vessel is worth at least $500,000.

Profit and loss matrix:

Customer Success Story:

Petro-Canada saves over $330,000 per year!

Petro-Canada: Refiners of petroleum products, including gasolines, diesel oils, heating oils, aviation fuels, heavy fuel oils, asphalts and feedstocks for lubricants and petrochemicals.

The Challenge:
A crude unit was experiencing a persistent cycling problem. Because of the magnitude of the cost savings associated with stabilizing the unit, the plant installed and implemented an advanced model prediction control package. This model predictive control package was unable to get rid of the cycling problem.

The Solution:
Service personnel were brought in. The service provider trained the personnel on using ExperTune software. Then they tested the regulatory control loops. ExperTune software identified some valve problems (that were repaired) and ExperTune software tuned the loops. 9% hysteresis and improper tuning was found on a critical loop.

The Result:
The persistent cycling problem has been cured on the crude unit.

Profit and loss matrix:

Aberdeen Group Case Study

Case Study - Sabic Innovative Plastics

Building on a prior corporate directive to reduce operating costs and improve equipment uptime, SABIC-IP continued performance management initiatives centered on operational performance within plant operations. The initiative, at one plant, tackled over 1,700 process control loops. "We originally started this project three years ago because management knew we needed to reduce instability caused by the variability of our operations," Keith Phillips, a process control engineer and team leader on the project in Burkville, Alabama.

Gathering data from control systems and data historians wasn’t enough to address operational performance. SABIC-IP needed to make informed decisions on how to reduce oscillations in the system, as well as tighten control limits. Operators did not have a good feel for how problems in one upstream process could affect a downstream one. Prior to this initiative SABIC-IP tuned most if its process control loops by "feel" and soon recognized that advanced control monitoring capabilities would solve many of their problems.

"One critical loop was for our hydrogen compression process, which is partially used to offset natural gas as an energy source," explained Phillips. "Once we used our new software to analyze loop interactions, we realized that a simple on/off control for an upstream fan was causing a temperature spike carrying through to our hydrogen compressor. By re-tuning our fan control loop, we were able to tighten our control limits and reduce the impact downstream. We recognized that because we had such large control limits before in the hydrogen compressor, we were not maximizing our hydrogen recovery. By tightening this upstream control and optimizing the hydrogen process we are able to save over $1 million per year in energy consumption."

By having control data and results to reference, process control engineers can communicate benefits to plant management and to the executive staff. Phillips explained, "In the past we had to use qualitative arguments to explain where we could reduce operating costs, but now we have the data to back it up. We can now show how tightening control with smaller tolerances can save money."

In an effort aimed by continuous improvement, SABIC-IP is now looking at how they can better manage asset performance. "We are trying to address the link between a process operation problem and the way in which an asset might have been installed or how it is maintained. When we find a new problem using our performance management initiative we are connecting this to an asset performance program to address the root cause. We are also creating reliability center for asset management to drive uptime. Operations will identify and prioritize the culprit and maintenance can then address it."

The Challenge:
Reduce operating costs and improve equipment uptime.

The Solution:
PlantTriage software.

The Result:
Savings of over $1 million annually.

Profit and loss matrix:

Customer Success Story:

Multinational Chemical Plant Sees Five-Fold Increase in Productivity!

The Solution:
PlantTriage software.

The Result:
A five-fold increase in productivity and double the life of the plant's valves. ExperTune won the 2003 Plant Services Problem Solver Award for this site.

According to Plant Services magazine "A major multinational chemical processor with tens of thousands of instruments and valves is receiving the benefits of five times the manpower by using PlantTriage performance monitoring software. The system also helps double the life of the company's valves."

Plant Services continues: "By looking at the most important areas listed in the "Biggest Payback Loop" list, the same maintenance people can oversee 10 times as many controllers as before, since the controllers are prioritized based on importance to the business."

Profit and loss matrix:

Customer Success Story:

Babcock and Wilcox Utility Boiler user saves over $300,000 per year!

The Challenge:
This paper mill utility boiler was not meeting the performance requirement.

The Solution:
ExperTune software tests done by the service provider showed the gains were too high on a few critical valves. Resized the valves. Re-tuned loops using ExperTune software.

The Result:
Passed performance test of a number of hours running at certain variability at a certain pressure and under load changes.

Profit and loss matrix: