A Self-tuning Regulator For Fluid Catalytic Cracking Units

The FCC converter is one of the most important units in petroleum refineries since it converts heavy residues of oil, without commercial value, into valuable products. In light of this, an adaptive control of adjustable auto regulating type (Self-tuning Regulator, STR) for a FCC unit is proposed. The controller uses a recursive estimator to achieve the process parameters and these are then used for calculation of the desired control action through the controller design module. The STR controller is composed by two parts, i.e., an external block, formed by a conventional controller directly connected to the real process, and an internal one, that accounts for the changes in the process and provides the new set of controller parameters to the conventional controller. The performance of the adaptive controller performance is discussed. This is an abstract of a paper presented at the 2006 AIChE Spring National Meeting (Orlando, FL 4/23-27/2006)