WPC Downstream Conference

With the need for cleaner gasoline and diesel fuels, new challenges arise with respect to lower sulphur contents in products (particularly of marine fuels, IMO 2020), cleaner feedstocks and residual processing. Improvements, e.g. of catalysts for HDS, FCC and alkylation could help in this respect. Also, emission reduction and co-processing of renewables are big issues. The major question is: Which innovative technologies will have an impact on the future of the refining sector?

Not just for process control, digital technology has increasingly been utilized for a wide range of purposes including closing the generation gap between operators, RBM/RBI and simultaneous management of several facilities, with technological progress such as AI and the internet of things and big data utilization. It has become an effective tool for asset management. This roundtable discussion will consider how digital technology is currently utilized for asset integrity. What are its advantages and disadvantages? What could the ideal model of digital technology for future asset integrity look like? And what will encourage or hinder the realization of the ideal model?