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Compressor controls properly designed compressor controls should not only protect the compressor, they should protect the process
Centrifugal compressors are common-place in many process plants due to their small footprint, lower installation cost and low maintenance cost, relative to positive displacement compressors. One significant shortcoming of a centrifugal compressor is its need for surge protection. Centrifugal compressors raise the pressure of a gas by accelerating the gas in an impeller, then, by Bernoullis principle, slowing the gas down in the diffuser section to convert the velocity energy into pressure energy. The velocity energy that is imparted to the gas is a function of the density of the gas and tangential velocity (tip speed) of the impeller. Therefore, with a given gas and impeller speed, there is a finite pressure ratio (discharge pressure vs. suction pressure) that can be supported by a centrifugal compressor.
Preventing surge
To prevent surge from occurring, a minimum flow controller must be implemented. Unfortunately, a minimum flow controller that is configured to protect against the worst case surge conditions will severely limit the turndown of the compressor. For processes that do not use the full capacity of the compressor at all times, a simple minimum flow controller will waste a lot of driver power. Figure 1 shows the surge limit line for a typical centrifugal compressor. As the pressure ratio increases, the surge limit flow increases. For many compressor applications, operating at lower flows also requires less pressure. To take advantage of this flow/pressure relationship, compressor control engineers sought techniques that modified the surge limit of the controller to match the actual surge limit of the compressor under all operating conditions.
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Figure1Typicalcompressorsurgelimitcurve
The earliest implementation of surge control based on surge line prediction that was invariant to gas conditions was introduced by the Foxboro Company in the mid-sixties. Using a single loop pneumatic controller, the surge line was characterized according to a P vs. h algorithm where P was the differential pressure across the compressor stage and h was the differential pressure across the suction flow meter. This technique pioneered by the Foxboro Company was the industry standard for a couple of decades and as long as the suction pressure was fairly constant, this algorithm and hardware setup was quite effective for compressor protection allowing significantly better turndown than was available from a simple minimum flow controller.
protecting the compressor against surge. A major complaint about these systems was the abruptness with which they would take action to protect the compressor. Since an anti-surge controller is usually not actively controlling (when the flow is well to the right of the surge line), the controller will be wound down until the operating point approaches the setpoint of the surge controller. The tuning parameters that are appropriate for this type of controller tend to be soft, which leads to a controller that is slow to react. And since flow signals are noisy, the derivative term of the PID cant be used. All these issues result in a protective controller that is slow to react and ultimately over-reaction when the controller error is severe. When an upset occurs in a process plant that causes the flow to drop suddenly or the pressure ratio to rise quickly, these digital anti-surge controllers will open the anti-surge valve(s) suddenly in order to prevent surge of the compressor. This protects the compressor, but can create disruptions to the process that are severe enough to trip the process unit. Some processes can experience damage to process equipment during such events.
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Adaptive tuning
Aggressive gain is useful for pushing the operating point away from the surge limit line when the operating point gets close the surge limit. But the aggressive gain can cause the controller operation to be nervous when operating at the normal setpoint of the controller. And as the operating point moves away from the control line, a reduced gain will keep a noisy flow signal from unnecessarily provoking controller action. Likewise, a high integral term is useful for pushing the operating point back to the setpoint and helping to drive the anti-surge valve closed more quickly if the process load increases suddenly.
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This will also give the performance controller the ability to precisely modulate the compressor output from zero to full load.
Surge anticipation
Algorithms that can anticipate surge or that limit the rate at which the operating point is allowed to drop can provide the performance controller a way of limiting the demand that is placed on the surge controller in the first place. To effectively manage the process demand, this type of feature works best when it is integrated with a performance controller decoupling feature. The use of this feature will not only reduce the demand on the surge controller, it will significantly soften the effect of the compressor control system actions on the process. Digital controls have provided intelligent protection systems for the problem of compressor surge that can improve the operating efficiency of the unit. But if the additional features are not incorporated that provide protection to the process, the gains in efficiency will be offset by the process disruptions. And worse yet, if the disruptions cause the operators to distrust the anti-surge system, they are more likely to defeat the system altogether. Integration of the compressor performance controls with the anti-surge controls along with incorporation of good compressor control features will allow the benefits of improved compressor protection to be realized without sacrificing the smooth operation of the process.
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