Patent Document ID: 20130204420
Application ID: 13817048
Patent Flag: 0

Claim One:
1. In a plant comprising a plurality of production process streams produced by a plurality of process units, each of the plurality of process units being controlled by a corresponding one of a plurality of multivariable constraint controllers, a system adapted to control the plurality of process units in real time, the system comprising: a test process module configured to determine validity of input process measurements for each of said plurality of process units and to determine whether a process of each of said plurality of process units is in a steady state; a reconciliation optimization module configured to receive the input process measurements thus validated from the test process module and to reconcile a process model for said plurality of process units against said validated input process measurements by applying a reconciliation objective function to provide a set of reconciled variables for the process model; an economic optimization module configured to receive a plurality of constraints and prices corresponding for the plurality of process units from a planning and optimization module and the set of reconciled variables, and to optimize said process model thus reconciled by applying an economic optimization function subject to the plurality of constraints to determine a set of operating targets for each of the plurality of process units; and the system being adapted to provide the set of operating targets to the plurality of multivariable constraint controllers.