(141e) Plant Wide Simulations for Process and Economic Analysis and Optimization at Ras Tanura Refinery

The optimum utilization of existing production facilities play an important role in the short and long term production planning strategy under varying dynamic market conditions. Plant utilization, operational efficiency and energy consumption etc. are some of the key factors which influence the overall plant economics. Appropriately developed plant wide models represent the process behavior starting from raw material feed to the final product. The complexity and rigor of the model depends on the extent of modeling, purpose and objective for which the models are intended to be utilized. As part of continuous improvement efforts, plant wide models were developed using KBC Technology and were deployed for process and economic analysis. This paper describes key characteristics of the process scheme at RasTanura Refinery, individual unit models along with the refinery wide model on Petro-SIM, utilization and effectiveness of plant wide model in carrying refinery scale simulations, identifying and analyzing process and economic optimization opportunities at Ras Tanura Refinery with few case study examples.