Data Integration in Petrochemical Pilot Plants by Software Optimization

This presentation will highlight the advantages and disadvantages of developing software to streamline data integration of a petrochemical pilot plant.  Process and analytical data from a pilot plant can be received in multiple formats.  Process data can be handwritten or located in a database.  Analytical data can be in spreadsheets, text documents, or images.  Transcribing and compiling this data in standard practices requires time and diligence to detail.

Pilot plants generate a significant amount of data from multiple experimental runs at different operating conditions. Data flow between pilot plant operators, chemical analysts, and data engineers must be efficient to continually improve operations based on the most recent data and trends.

Developing software to streamline the data flow between pilot plant operators, chemical analysts, and data analysts becomes a necessity.  This developed software will transition personnel from using spreadsheets as the centralized data source to extracting data from a database.  The software will integrate into the current Laboratory Information Management System (LIMS) and be linkable to a database historian on the process control system.  Analytical data sheets and process data graphs from the database will be generated as new entries are entered.  Further development of the software includes building comparison data tables as specified by the data engineer and applying statistical overlays to analytical and process data.

The end result is a continually improving software system that provides efficient data turn around between operations, analysts, and engineers.