Case Study: Phillips 66 achieves ahead-of-schedule, minimal-downtime blend upgrade with Honeywell Experion Ratio Controller (ERC)

Phillips 66 Alliance Refinery Upgrades to Experion® Ratio Controller (ERC)

Phillips 66 Alliance Refinery, a 247,000 BPD single-train refinery near New Orleans, needed to upgrade its Honeywell Experion PKS distributed control system because Microsoft was retiring Windows XP and the existing Experion Blend Controller (EBC) was incompatible with the new EPKS R410 platform. The goal was to complete the migration during a planned 2015 outage while minimizing blender downtime and preserving blend control and reporting capabilities.

Honeywell implemented an on‑process migration of Experion PKS R310.3 to R410.4 with an off‑process upgrade from EBC to the Experion Ratio Controller (ERC R410.3), including hardware replacements, Factory and Site Acceptance Testing, and staged header commissioning. The coordinated approach — including four days for server/controller migration, FAT/SAT, and header testing of five headers — returned the system to operations ahead of schedule, reduced SCADA points, and delivered improved blend control and reporting functionality under Honeywell’s solution.

Phillips 66

Ronnie Langlois

Experion & Blending Engineer