Activity

  • Challenges in Refining Tight Oil

    Jim Cahill
    If you’re like me you may have you wondered why with all the U.S. shale oil production , there are calls to change federal law to allow exports even though the U.S is a large oil importer . The answer comes to me in an excellent Chemical Engineering Progress (CEP) article, Working with Tight Oil , by Emerson’s Tim Olsen . The article looks at the impact of tight oil, also known as light tight oil, from shale on refineries…

  • Optimizing Refinery Blending Operations

    Jim Cahill
    Optimized process control begins with accurate and reliable measurements. A Process Engineering article, For good measure (pp 39-40) highlights new measurement technologies which can be used in critical plant processes. The applications described range from clean-in-place operations in pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical processes to refinery blending operations. Emerson’s Marcelo Carugo describes how most manual…

  • Advancing the Cause of Process Automation

    Jim Cahill
    Tim Olsen Refining Industry Consultant As members of the process automation and instrumentation community, it is always great to be recognized for contributions advancing our craft. I wanted to take the opportunity of today’s post to congratulate Emerson’s Tim Olsen for recognition by the AIChE Fuels and Petrochemicals Division . At their awards dinner to be held Monday April 27 in Austin, Texas , Tim will receive…

  • Meeting Lower Sulfur Tier 3 Regulations for U.S. Refiners

    Jim Cahill
    Earlier this year the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized their "Tier 3" vehicle emission and fuel standards rules with the stated purpose to reduce air pollution from passenger cars and trucks. For refiners, part of these rules include the content of sulfur in fuels. According to the EPA : Starting in 2017, Tier 3 sets new vehicle emissions standards and lowers the sulfur content of gasoline, considering…

  • Solving Refinery Coating Challenges in Flow Meters

    Jim Cahill
    The post Solving Refinery Coating Challenges in Flow Meters appeared first on the Emerson Process Experts blog. Collaborative problem solving occurs in all kinds of ways—face-to-face, over the phone, via email, and online in blogs, on-line communities, wikis, and social networks. Tom O’Banion Industry Director I mention this because I saw some great guidance on flow meter coating challenges in refining applications…

  • A Primer on Refinery Operations

    Jim Cahill
    If you’re not in the oil refining business the names of the process units, such as cat crackers, can sound quite exotic. Emerson’s Tim Olsen, a consultant on the refining industry team, wrote a great AIChE Chemical Engineering Progress article, An Oil...

  • Refinery Goals to Improve Operator Effectiveness Achieved

    Jim Cahill
    Coming out of our recent global consultant meeting here in Austin, I heard a great story from Emerson’s Glyn Westlake about a Spanish refinery that wanted to provide their operators with an identical and realistic environment to learn and gain familiarity...

  • Light Tight Oil and Heat Exchanger Fouling

    Jim Cahill
    I received an email of a new whitepaper, Heat Exchanger Challenges with Light Tight Crude! written by Emerson’s Tim Olsen. Tim is a consultant on our refining industry team and has shared his expertise in numerous refining-related posts here on the blog...

  • Challenges in Processing Opportunity Crudes

    Jim Cahill
    Additional sources of oil, such as shale oil, coming into the market can pose challenges for refiners. The challenge comes from mixing these “opportunity crudes” with other types of crude oil that may have very different physical properties. As a Digital...

  • Fired Heater Safety and Burner Management Systems

    Jim Cahill
    Back in March in a post, Safety System Considerations for Process Fired Heaters, I shared some thoughts from a presentation by Emerson’s Nikki Bishop and David Sheppard. The good news is that their thoughts are now available in a PTQ article, Role of...

  • Custody Transfer Risk Assessment

    Jim Cahill
    It is one thing to transfer ownership between seller and buyer when the item sold comes in discrete units. It’s another when it is a free-flowing fluid through pipes. In the process industries, this ownership transfer is known as custody transfer. Wikipedia...

  • Adding Missing Measurements in Refineries

    Jim Cahill
    We’re now about six weeks away from the September 30-Oct 4 Emerson Exchange conference in the Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas area. In fact, today, August 15, 2013 is the deadline for Early Bird registration—so if you were considering joining us, you’ll want...

  • Valve Actuators for Reliable Delayed Coker Operations

    Jim Cahill
    Many of the units in a refinery operate under harsh conditions. Perhaps one of the harshest is the delayed coker unit. At the time of writing this post, Wikipedia defines this unit: A delayed coker is a type of coker whose process consists of heating...

  • Fired Heater Safety Standards and Burner Management

    Jim Cahill
    In an earlier post, Safety System Considerations for Process Fired Heaters, I highlighted an American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) paper by Emerson’s Nikki Bishop and Dave Sheppard. In this post, I’ll share the safety system design, selection...

  • Safety System Considerations for Process Fired Heaters

    Jim Cahill
    The American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) will hold their 2013 annual meeting next week, just down the road from here in San Antonio Texas. This March 17-19 conference assembles key executives, decision-makers, and technical experts from...

  • Steps to Effective PID Loop Tuning

    Jim Cahill
    Sometimes when you read an article about tuning proportional-integral-derivative (PID) loops, you’re treated to all the 2nd order differential equations they contain. These can be intimidating, especially if your college calculus classes are many years...

  • Improving Refinery Operations through Technology

    Jim Cahill
    For producers of commodity products, profitability primarily comes from operational excellence—that is optimizing costs to run the process as efficiently as possible. In the U.K-based PTQ article, Refinery operations gain from advances in digital automation...

  • Addressing the Renewable Fuel Standard and Blend Wall

    Jim Cahill
    Federal, state, and local regulations keep changing and impact process manufacturers’ operations. Emerson’s Patrick Truesdale provided an update on the US Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) at a past American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers conference ...

  • American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers Q and A and Technology Forum

    Jim Cahill
    The American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers (formerly NPRA) are holding a Q&A and Technology Forum October 1-3, in Salt Lake City, Utah. Emerson’s Tim Olsen, whom you may recall from earlier refinery-related posts, shared with me that several Emerson...

  • Start with the Pipe Racks and Branches for Your Wireless Communications Infrastructure

    Jim Cahill
    In refineries and petrochemical plants, pipe racks are the “backbones” of the process units. It is also the place Emerson’s Gary Hawkins, a senior refining consultant, recommends should be completely covered with an IEC 62591 wireless device communications...

  • Large Capacity Coriolis Flow and Density Measurement

    Jim Cahill
    I saw a tweet about “return-flow-from-rig capabilities” from Oil, Gas & Petrochem Equipment (OG&PE) publisher and editor, J.B. Avants. He points to a video where he interviews Emerson’s Denver Smart about applications for Micro Motion high-capacity Coriolis...

  • Refinery Desalter Guided Wave Radar Level Measurement

    Jim Cahill
    Hydrocarbon Engineering magazine published an article by Emerson’s Sarah Parker, Using Guided Wave Radar for desalter interface measurements will improve efficiency, increase reliability and reduce maintenance. The article is not available online to non...

  • Quick Hit Path to Plant Optimization

    Jim Cahill
    For U.S. refiners, the bulk of project spending is on core business drivers including safety, environmental performance, and reliability programs. Projects that optimize performance and improve energy efficiency often don’t make the cut. At the AIChE...

  • Applying Automation Advances in Refineries

    Jim Cahill
    Update and bump: Tim just let me know that he’s been elected to the position of 2nd Vice Chair for the AIChE Fuels & Petrochemicals Division (FPD). As described below, he’ll serve a four-year term including one year as division president. Congratulations...

  • Alternative Fuels from Coal and Petroleum Coke Gasification

    Jim Cahill
    As yesterdays’s Wall Street Journal points out in the article, Cramped on Land, Big Oil Bets at Sea, oil companies have to look in increasingly difficult places to find energy. As energy producers look beyond oil and gas for other energy sources, alternative...

This is the official online community site of the Emerson Global Users Exchange, a forum for the free exchange of non-proprietary information among the global user community of all Emerson Automation Solution's products and services. Our goal is to improve the efficiency and use of automation systems and solutions employed at members’ facilities by sharing our knowledge, experiences, and application information.

User Groups | World Areas | Community Guidelines | Legal Information | Privacy Policy | Contact Community Manager

Website translation provided by Website Translator

© 2015-2022 Emerson Global Users Exchange. All rights reserved.