CRACKER - a PC based simulator for industrial cracking furnaces

Ethylene plant is one of the largest plants and the thermal cracking furnac e is a key unit in the ethylene plant. Since ethylene is the basic material in the chemical industry and the market situation of not only the feed and the product, but also the utility is rapidly changing, the optimal operati on of the plant is important. CRACKER, a PC based software of thermal crack ing furnaces is developed based on the rigorous first principles model whic h can reflect the effects of the operating variables. CRACKER has a user-fr iendly graphic interface for the convenient use and also provides a feed ch aracterization module, which can estimate the composition of conventional c omponents from the commercially available indices. By using CRACKER, the et hylene plant operators can understand the furnace system well and easily di agnose the current operation and, thus, can make both the optimal operation strategy according to the market and the optimal co-cracking strategy acco rding to the characteristics of the purchased naphtha. Also in the purchase of naphtha, the feed characterization module can help to determine the bet ter naphtha for the plant based on the price of the naphtha and products. ( C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.