Article
An intelligent system for batch scheduling for the process industry
Computers in Industry
(2003)
Abstract
Traditional scheduling tools for continuous process industries have not been developed with batch processing in mind. Efficient batch processing requires intelligent scheduling tools. The principal contribution of this research is the development of an architecture which combines intelligent tools with a virtual plant for performing management tasks. One of the intelligent tools, a flexible scheduling algorithm based on object-oriented constructs to schedule batch processes, is presented. A virtual plant is used to map chemical processes with equipment in the plant. The scheduling algorithm then uses a database of current customer orders and a knowledge base that contains rules about customer priority, equipment cleaning, process preference, equipment history, batch sequencing rules, cost history, cost estimates, and other knowledge to aid the user in the selection of the appropriate schedule. The uniqueness of this approach is the integration of a virtual plant, which can be viewed as a static plant simulation model, with a rule-based scheduling approach.
Keywords
- Batch processing,
- Scheduling,
- Expert systems,
- Object-oriented programming,
- Continuous processes
Publication Date
February 28, 2003
DOI
10.1016/0166-3615(93)90091-E
Citation Information
Yasser Dessouky, T Beaumariage, Chell A Roberts and Mike Ogle. "An intelligent system for batch scheduling for the process industry" Computers in Industry Vol. 22 Iss. 3 (2003) p. 233 - 247 ISSN: 0166-3615 Available at: http://works.bepress.com/yasser_dessouky/20/