Maximize crude unit No. 2 oil yield design and operation

Recent refinery industry trends are to optimize crude unit operation with advanced control technology such as real-time-optimization. One potential crude unit optimization objective could be maximizing diesel product yields and minimizing the quantity of diesel boiling range material in the FCC feed. Appropriately designed advanced process control technology for a crude unit can be used to fully utilize existing equipment performance. The advanced process control scheme (or operator) can adjust the appropriate process variables to optimize the diesel yields against the current unit limitations. Process and equipment design changes may nevertheless be required to fully implement the diesel product optimization, depending on the crude unit equipment limitations. Therefore, crude unit process variable optimization and potential equipment design issues should be carefully addressed. While each refinery crude unit`s design, operation and equipment constraints are different, the fundamental operating variables and the process and equipment design issues are common to all crude units.