Patent Document ID: 20070032907
Application ID: 11458522
Patent Flag: 0

Claim One:
1. A method for determining the best operating practice for an industrial process at a plant, comprising the steps of: reviewing normal operation data for a normal configuration of equipment at said plant; specifying a time-dependent perturbation based on the review of said normal operation data; applying said perturbation to one or more inputs to give a signature in said normal operation data; acquiring measured response data from said inputs with said signature to form a perturbation test data set; analyzing said perturbation test data set, further comprising the steps of: filtering said perturbation test data set; and, carrying out matrix calculations for said perturbation test data set by solving for a value φ i within a set of simultaneous equations of the form: Δ ⁢ ⁢ y = ∑ all ⁢ ⁢ i ⁢ ϕ i ⁢ Δ ⁢ ⁢ x i wherein y is a measured response variable, x i are variables for said inputs, and φ i are transfer functions describing correlations between x and y; and, quantifying said φ i to allow said normal configuration of said equipment to be optimized without changing said normal configuration to determine said best operating practice.