Capacity refinery network

Table 5.1 Major refinery network capacity constraints.

Constraints (5.13) and (5.14) represent the material balance that governs the operation of the petrochemical system. The variable x 1 represents the annual level of production of process m Mpa where ttcpm is the input-output coefficient matrix of material cp in process m Mpel. The petrochemical network receives its feed from potentially three main sources. These are, (i) refinery intermediate streams of an intermediate product cir RPI, (ii) refinery final products Ff ri of a final product cfr RPF, and (iii) non-refinery streams Fn px of a chemical cp NRF. For a given subset of chemicals cp CP, the proposed model selects the feed types, quantity and network configuration based on the final chemical and petrochemical lower and upper product demand Dpet and DPet for each cp CFP, respectively. In constraint (5.15), defining a binary variable yproc et for each process m Mpet is required for the process selection requirement as yproc et will equal 1 only if process m is selected or zero otherwise. Furthermore, if only process m is selected, its production level must be at least equal to the process minimum economic capacity B m for each m Mpet, where Ku is a valid upper... 

This example illustrates the performance of the proposed approach on a single site total refinery planning problem. The refinery scale, capacity and configuration mimic an existing refinery in the Middle East. Figure 7.1 is a state equipment network (SEN)... 

Gasoline is transported from one refinery to a single terminal through a pipeline or by tanker-trucks see Figure 1. The empty tanker-trucks are returned to the refinery to be reloaded for the succeeding delivery. The feasible network structures vary depending on the operating costs and capacity constraints of the pipeline and tanker-trucks. The resultant combinatorially feasible as well as feasible network structures are presented in Tables 2 and 3 for two sets of capacity constraints. 

For the feedstock, there are logistical and sustainability concerns. Each potential biorefinery concept has specific coproduct and waste issues to consider. Transport is a general issue in this discussion. The biomass resource has to be transported to the refinery subsequently the products have to be transported to the downsdeam industry and/or the consumer. Of interest is the approach of the company Nature-Works LLC that currently operates the largest biorefinery in the United States in Blair, Nebraska. The nameplate capacity of the polymer production plant is 140,000 tons of polymer per year. Corn is the basis for the production of the bioplastic polylactic acid (PLA) in a complex multistage process. Sixty percent of its com feedstock is obtained from the local area (producers, located less than 40 kilometers from the plant). Several companies in an emergent network are now active on the Blair biorefinery campus (Wells and Zapata, 2012) reducing transportation from one industrial branch to the next one. 

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