The benefits of using a training simulator are realized in many ways, including significant economic savings, improved safety, more effective use of controls, increased training efficiency, facilitation of procedure development, and more:
- Quicker Start-Up and Commissioning
- Operator Pre-Training
- Long Term Operator Training
- Engineer and Maintenance Training
- More Efficient Process Operation
- Design and verification tool for plant upgrades
- Reduced Life Cycle Costs
- Ease of Future Expandability
- Qualification Programs
One of the major and immediate benefits of the simulator is realized when it is used for the testing and tuning of new control logic, prior to plant commissioning. This application identifies unforeseen logic changes and allows a head start on setting tunable parameters. Due to the high fidelity of the models, the operating procedures and control logic are rigorously tested during the development and testing of the simulator. This has proven to dramatically reduce initial startup problems and cut startup time, thereby reducing costs significantly.
Training simulators can also be used by operations personnel, technicians, engineers, and management to meet a number of needs:
- Since a simulator faithfully represents the plant, operations personnel can use it to develop operating procedures, teach operators new features and procedures, qualify operators for promotions, develop and test new screens and controls, and examine causes of frequent problems. This is all done without disturbing the production facilities.
- With a training simulator, plant operators can operate a virtual plant, using controls and interfaces that are the same as in the actual plant. Operators will experience plant responses and results of their operations with high accuracy. This reduces initial startup problems dramatically, and shortens training duration for new plant or control system upgrades.
- Since actual plant malfunctions may occur very infrequently, the simulator provides a method by which the operators can be trained to be ready for a multitude of possible malfunctions to which they would not otherwise be exposed. Serious plant equipment damage is often avoided when operators are properly trained with simulated malfunctions.
- Training simulators help to insure uniform operation of the plant, leading to consistent and efficient operating procedures followed by all operators. This is a very important factor in both economic and safety considerations.
- Control technicians can develop control system logic changes and test those changes against the simulator. Inexperienced technicians can practice tuning controls and installing upgrades without affecting actual plant operation.
- Investigation of process and operational changes by engineers is simplified with the use of the simulator. For example, engineering staff can investigate the heat rate and life expenditure effects of changes such as adding a bypass valve or damper or changing the startup procedure.
- Experienced engineers can experiment with existing control logic to develop modifications and implement new control schemes. They can then use the simulator to fully tune the modifications before they are implemented in a "live" plant situation, thus eliminating unforeseen problems and facilitating a smoother integration of new control schemes.
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