SECCO applying predictive modeling to polymer processes

London -- Shanghai SECCO Petrochemicals Company Ltd. (SECCO) is to deploy model predictive control (MPC) technology on six polymer lines at its manufacturing facility in the Shanghai Chemical Industrial Park. The extruder and reactor control applications from Pavilion are being installed to increase production rates and enhance product quality.

SECCO is a $2.7-billion joint venture between BP, Sinopec and Shanghai Petrochemical Corp. (SPC) with equity holdings of 50:30:20 percent respectively. The SECCO complex comprises a naphtha cracker and downstream plants including styrene, acrylonitrile and also polyethylene, polypropylene and polystyrene.

SECCO will deploy Pavilion’s control solutions on two Innovene polyethylene lines, one Innovene polypropylene line and three polystyrene lines.The company selected Pavilion following a ValueFirst customer study which indicated a possible 4% increase in production rate for polyolefins and up to 30% improvement in product quality in both the polyolefin and polystyrene units

Pavilion was chosen based on its track record in polymers, said Paul Bowdler, production director, Shanghai SECCO Petrochemical. “This, along with Pavilion's ValueFirst customer satisfaction guarantee, ultimately provided us with the confidence we needed to move forward with this project.”

The SECCO project represents the first large-scale deployment of Pavilion's Polymer Solution in China. According to the software firm, the deal raises its total number of MPC deployments to more than 90 polymer lines and 115 reactors worldwide.

Pavilion lists customers for its model-based software as including: Cemex, Dyckerhoff AG, Glacial Lakes Energy, Nova Chemicals, Nestlé, SABIC Europe and Total Petrochemicals.