Second only to crude oil, electrical power is typically one of the highest production costs and key elements in the refining business. In the extremely competitive petrochemical industry, products are produced 24 hours/day - 7 days/week and pumped directly into the market without an inventory buffer. Unscheduled interruptions or disturbances which affect process equipment can lead to millions of dollars in lost production and electrical equipment if not managed properly. Therefore, the continuous supply of high quality power is essential to survival in the refining industry. This paper describes one west coast Refinery's success in proactively managing 110MW of power consumption with their PowerLogic power monitoring and control system that paid for itself in less than one year after it was fully commissioned.

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A chemical manufacturing company needed a more efficient and controlled way to ensure compliance with an automated Time of Use/Dispatch Power rate schedule from their utility. Plant personnel however, had no way of knowing power usage and were unequipped to shed load when directed by the utility system. A PowerLogic system with circuit monitors was installed and programmed to automatically identify which areas of the manufacturing process needed to cut back usage when called on. Based on programmed setpoints the circuit monitor for each area signaled operators to trim power usage. The PowerLogic system provided a simple solution for avoiding expensive demand charges.

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A PowerLogic system installed to help keep an eye on costs helps uncover costly errors in the plants utility metering. After reviewing data from PowerLogic System Manager Software, a company executive discovered a major discrepancy between system manager reported data and the utility bill in regards to power factor. Further investigation revealed an uncalibrated utility meter resulting in a $250K credit for past power factor penalty charges.

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A petroleum refinery was experiencing unexplained periodic trips of five large synchronous compressor motors. Each trip resulted in approximately $150,000 in costs due to production losses and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) fines. After installing a Square D PowerLogic system, the refinery personnel were able to ascertain the cause of the compressor trips and the problem was corrected.

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When Valero's pipeline group wanted to be able to more accurately account for energy usage, they looked to Schneider Electric?s local Square D team for a solution, which revealed that the refinery was over-billing them to the tune of $200,000 a year!

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Stephen Pauli is with Bayer Material Science in Baytown, Texas. This article first appeared in its original form at the 2003 IEEE/IAS Petroleum and Chemical Industry Technical Committee Conference. The IEEE Industrial Application Solutions published this paper in the Volume 11, Issue 2 in 2005 and granted permission for this posting. The paper is a guide to specifying, justifying, and installing substation monitoring and control systems based on Bayer's experience. Between 1996 and 1999, a large chemical firm made US$1 billion in capital investments, adding production capacity and doubling the site load to 220 MW. This growth strained the capacity of critical substations to carry loads had its companion transformer failed(in a typical main-tie-main arrangement). In parallel to a year 2000 cogeneration agreement, this firm funded a US$13 million project to improve the electrical distribution system infrastructure. This project installed a third 138-kV yard, a 138 kV/34.5 kV 2 × 64 MVA substation, and a satellite 2 × 34 MVA 13.8 kV substation.

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