Syncrude Canada is the world's largest producer of crude oil from oil sands, and the largest single source producer in Canada.

Currently it supplies 13 per cent of the nation's petroleum requirement. Syncrude's Upgrader Expansion (UE-1) project is expected to increase crude oil production by about 100 000 barrels per day using the company's proven process for extracting bitumen from the oil sands that lie in huge deposits in northern Alberta.
As part of this project, Emerson Process Management has received an order for an extensive asset management system based on its online AMS Suite: Intelligent Device Manager. The order follows a successful pilot application of AMS Device Manager at Syncrude where the investment paid for itself several times over.
The AMS Device Manager will connect nearly 10 000 HART field instruments, and will contribute to a reduction in the time required to verify their operational readiness.
Gil Hurtubise, a consultant to the Syncrude expansion project, described the impact: "We won't have to do all those time-consuming point-to-point wiring checks. With the AMS Device Manager, we'll verify the operation of each instrument, do one check on each control loop, and that will be it. Based on previous experience, I estimate this procedure will cut instrument commissioning time at least in half, which will amount to significant savings for Syncrude."
"The commissioning phase is critical to schedule and cost. We are pleased that the Syncrude pilot application has verified the time savings that we've worked to deliver with AMS Device Manager," said John Berra, president of Emerson Process Management.
Because the AMS Device Manager communicates online with HART field instruments, including many Emerson products, it is the ideal tool for checking out new instrumentation during construction. It uses standards-based software to interface with HART-enabled field instruments.
Instrument commissioning andloop-checking can be done in a few minutesby one person from a central location, whereas in the past personnel were typically required to walk through and climb around a plant under construction to find each instrument and confirm its wiring - atime-consuming task in plants withthousands of field instruments such as at Syncrude.
Pierre Tremblay, Syncrude's area integration leader for process automation, commented on commissioning savings, "The AMS Device Manager software enables us to reduce the amount of time required to verify that new instruments are in the right place, are properly configured, and are operational, something that has been very time intensive in the past."
Operational savings from ongoing use of AMS Device Manager will arise after commissioning. "Once the new plant goes into operation, this system will be one element of our predictive maintenance programme that is expected to result in more savings for the company," Tremblay said. "By providing better information about the condition of our equipment, we will be able to maintain or replace equipment as needed - not on some pre-determined schedule that has nothing to do with its operating condition."
AMS Device Manager is fully integrated with Emerson's new AMS Suite: Asset Portal that unifies data on the condition of mechanical equipment, process equipment, instruments and valves, and automates the flow of information to those who run the business. Through the AMS Asset Portal, managers can view current and historical data on the condition of all their critical production assets to expedite decision-making.

Reducing variation

The Lubrizol Corporation has just formed a broad alliance with Emerson Process Management to further optimise Lubrizol plants around the globe with PlantWeb services and technologies. The goal is to make further strides in reducing process and product variation, provide customers with more consistent, higher quality products and to further drive costs out of the Lubrizol manufacturing processes.
The first installation of a DeltaV system at Lubrizol was in Lanzhou China in 2002. Since then, the company has expanded the DeltaV system into its largest base of production in Houston, Texas, as well as many other sites.
As part of the alliance agreement, Emerson and several of Emerson's local business partners participate with Lubrizol's operations management systems (OMS) teams and help identify mutual business opportunities, develop standards, perform system life planning to transition older legacy control systems, and identify technologies that will help Lubrizol further improve their processes. Similarly, Lubrizol is contributing knowledge and information that is benefiting Emerson as well.
Bob Wojewodka, team leader of the Lubrizol OMS steering team, said: "Our path forward includes leveraging our business systems, maufacturing systems, and process analysis/improvement systems. Our assessment showed that PlantWeb technology is a good fit to dovetail with our vision and path forward."
Lubrizol began the evaluation process early in 2000, and in 2002 signed an alliance agreement with Emerson. Technical functionality, migration capabilities, information integration, global support capabilities and the vendor's long range directions all weighed heavily in the selection process.
Emerson and Lubrizol are working to establish objectives for automation improvements on asite-by-site basis, yet coordinating this initiative across sites to leverage methodology and systems. The overarching aim of the projected investments is to provide capability to analyse and reduce process variation, further improve product quality, and further optimise manufacturing processes. o