Operator Training Simulator Handbook

Best practices for developing and investing in OTS

Joseph Philip

BIRMINGHAM—MUMBAI

Operator Training Simulator Handbook

Copyright © 2022 Packt Publishing

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First published: March 2022

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My thanks go to my wife, Dr. Nada Philip, for being such a motivator for me and giving me the best advice when I need it; to my daughter, Sarah, who completed my family and has given me wonderful times over the years; to my parents, who are no longer with us; and to my brother, Philip Philip, who taught me the basic engineering rules very early on.

Foreword

Joseph Philip and I met on a project in the south of France several decades ago. A mixture of disciplines in engineering, process operations, and simulation training came together on that day and it is all highlighted in this publication. It also developed a union and friendship that can be described in two words, "datum" and "verbatim." These words connect the author and myself together, as we have both collected facts and accurate information throughout our work experience in simulation over several decades. We have shared our experiences over many years of working on power stations, nuclear plants, chemical complex operations, and on- and offshore oil and gas production.

My experience has been gained from decades of work with a leading innovative company that showed forward thinking in developing chemical, gas, and oil production. This work involved traveling around the world to assist with major projects and joint ventures. The company was ahead of its time and believed in investing in simulation and regular training. This simulator training included refresher courses for long-serving staff together with customized courses for new recruits.

My first involvement and experience of this type of simulator training was in the 1970s, at a time when it was an expensive investment. This experience of simulation launched a lifelong battle to justify this approach and quantify the benefits. However, it became quickly obvious that simulation training improved the reliability of production and allowed the measurement of competence assurance of all the operational staff. Staff became much more confident in showing their ability to deal with upset conditions and emergency situations. Simulator training delivered scenarios that enhanced understanding and increased the speed of response for all levels of operational staff. This type of simulation training had not previously been possible and was not in the project budget.

The debate of costs versus benefits in regard to simulator training will always exist and only the gathering of evidence will settle this discussion once and for all. The author and I share a common goal in this endeavor as we have worked together for many decades and on numerous projects around the world.

We were present in the simulation field at the very beginning, being asked for generic models that would include distillation columns with analog control panels. This analog control was ironically driven by a digital program that was punched into a reel of paper tape. In the early days, things did not improve when analog controls were replaced with digital instruments and eventually digital control screens. These early ground-breaking digital systems gave us the first version of the Distributed Control System.

These DCS systems and simulator programs were produced by many different manufacturers jostling for a place in the market. In some cases, graphics had to be drawn with x and y coordinates for every individual pixel on the screen. Separate labor-intensive and difficult mathematical blocks such as pump blocks had to be produced for each simulated model. This resulted in simulation being an expensive emulation of the process and control system. This has evolved and has systematically been replaced with copies of the real project data. This long campaign to use a copy of the actual plant safety system and real data has been supported by the author of this book.

You will see in this book how the author also assisted with the replacement of emulation by remarkable innovations such as the digital twin simulation. This has evolved into the remarkable digital twin simulation systems we have today. The digital twin is a real-time duplicated copy of the process and the control scheme. One of the major benefits of a digital twin is that the simulation is using an actual copy of the safety system used on the plant process. We can now benefit from authentic copies of the real process control and emergency systems.

In the early days, it was difficult to justify the expense of providing a training or engineering simulation. The author and I have been involved in numerous successful projects that have delivered major savings. We have shown the benefits and justification to warrant the procurement of simulators.

This book will describe how to scope the most economical simulation projects. The aim is to show how you can recoup the costs with major benefits in testing and competence achieved. This book shows how to take advantage of the latest technology by providing an economic digital twin simulation of your process.

Frank David Todd

Retired CEO experienced in scoping simulators and training the trainer in simulation and competence assurance testing

Contributors

About the author

Joseph Philip is the director of PSOTS Limited, which has offered operator training simulator consultancy services in the energy sector since 2013 and is based in London, UK. Joseph has delivered operator training simulators and digital twins in the oil and gas, chemical, energy, and petrochemical sectors for more than 30 years. He has delivered these systems all over the world to major companies such as BP, Shell, and Total, as well as working for Yokogawa Australia and delivering power plant simulators in Australia and Asia. He moved to the UK in 2001 to work for AspenTech. In 2004, he worked for Honeywell, and then, in 2007, he moved to Invensys (Schneider Electric), delivering operator training simulator and digital twin systems in Europe, the US, China, and the Middle East.

I have to start my acknowledgment by thanking a couple of people who have had a great impact on my career. Firstly, my brother-in-law, Mr. Sargon Murad. When I was in high school in the late 1970s, Sargon taught me the BASIC programming language, and my first program was this:

10 Input a

20 Input b

30 Input c

40 Let d = a^c * b^c – a*b*c

50 Print d

The moment you entered a value for a, b, and c, the value of d for this complicated equation was displayed. At the time, I thought, wow … I wish I could use this device in my exams!

This is how I started my journey with computer programming.

Secondly, I would like to mention my BSc undergraduate supervisor (and later MSc supervisor), Dr. Younis Al-Fakhri. Dr. Younis introduced me to simulation.

At my first job with Techcomm in Australia, I had the pleasure of working with some very intelligent people who had an impact on me, namely, Ngoc Bui, Brij Gupta, Jack Seger, and David Whan.

Similarly, in the UK, I worked with some very knowledgeable people in the field during my time at AspenTech, Honeywell, and Invensys. I would like to thank Chris Hart, Martin Sneesby, Gurinder Gill, and Aitor Olea for their friendship and professionalism.

While working as a consultant for BP, again, I met some OTS specialists that I would like to thank: the late Carl Slatter, Jo Elder, Frank Todd, and Brian Bain.

I want to pay a special tribute to Frank Todd, as he agreed to review the book, had input in the training chapter of the book, and allowed me to use his training module as an example.

Frank and I first met in 2001 when we worked on the first simulator, and we met again in 2013 to work on another.

At Maersk Oil, I met Ally Douglas and would like to thank him for his support during the time we worked together and delivered a very successful OTS.

I would like to thank my book reviewers, Chris Hart and Prateek Agarwal. I know reviewing some chapters around Christmas was challenging.

I would like to thank the Packt team, who really helped me to get the book into shape.

Finally, I would like to thank my family: my wonderful wife, Dr. Nada Philip, and my chemical engineer daughter, Sarah Philip.

About the reviewers

Chris Hart graduated from Loughborough University with a BSc in chemical engineering and then graduated from Imperial College with an MSc in control systems. Chris has worked on process simulation, advanced process control, and operator training simulators throughout his career of 35 years, working with several process industry simulation and control systems companies.

Prateek Agarwal has several years of experience in the energy sector across the globe. He has experience in leading cross-functional and multicultural teams consisting of technology specialists, software engineers, marketing professionals, and product owners and executing complex projects in the energy sector. Prateek is skilled in operation management, product management, strategy management, and business development support. He has a Master in Business Administration (M.B.A) from Aalto University (EE), Helsinki, Finland and Master in Science (M.Sc) from French Institute of Petroleum (IFP School), Paris, France after completing his Bachelor in Technology (B.Tech) from National Institute of Technology (NIT), Trichy, India.