Scheduling of Straight Multiproduct Pipelines Considering the Contamination Control

Abstract

Batch interface tracking and contamination control are the key technologies for the operation and management of multiproduct pipelines. Existing studies only focused on sequence arrangement or segment stoppage to control the generated contamination, and few considered this problem comprehensively and systematically. This study fully considers the contamination control process and develops a scheduling model for straight pipelines to minimize the cost of contamination loss caused by segment stoppage. The objective of this model is to minimize the restart cost of idle segments and the penalty cost due to improper interface placement during segment stoppage. Three types of constraints for contamination control are proposed, namely operation control, flow rate control, and stoppage control. Three real-world multiproduct pipelines are used as examples to validate the proposed method. Compared with the actual operation schemes, the method helps to reduce the number of stoppage operations by 20%–50%, and decrease the probability that the interface is improperly located by 40%–67%. Therefore, this work can reduce the cost of contamination treatment and bring greater benefits to pipeline operators.