(48e) Parallel Distillation Calculations Using Openmp

With current CPU speeds reaching a practical maximum value, CPU manufacturers are now creating CPU's with multiple cores to allow  for parallel processing.  However, most process design simulators do not take advantage of parallelism.  This paper presents  speedup results for solving rigorous distillation columns by Newton's Method using OPENMP.  A new thermodynamic engine was developed and used here  which allows for parallel computation of thermodynamic properties such as the fugacity coefficients, enthalpies and also the associated  temperature and composition derivatives.  Strategies to avoid cache misses and keep relevant data in the L1 and L2 caches are discussed.  Results are presented for the speedups obtained by calculating the thermodynamic properties, equation residuals and jacobian elements  in parallel.  The systems studied are rigorous superfractionator and demethanizer distillation columns.