Training aids and locations
The Training Aids subsection at the APC-network.com website has links (a few broken) to several dozen articles, presentations and other sites with educational materials about advanced process control (APC).
Read the articles
-- APC-network.com
APC mastery at McMaster U
The McMaster Advanced Control Consortium (MACC) promotes process automation and related process systems engineering through academia-industry interactions, but it also includes a boatload of tutorials, newsletters and other education materials about APC.
Visit the website
-- McMaster Advanced Control Consortium
Advanced video collection
A collection of short, animated videos make up the APC tutorial webpage within the larger Siemens website. Topics covered by the tutorials include an APC overview, tools, multivariable process control (MPC), using PLC in a distillation column, creating an MPC model and several others.
See the videos
-- Siemens
"APC ain't easy" article
A cornerstone article in Control on advanced control in the real world is "APC ain't easy" by then senior technical editor Dan Hebert. He took a deep dive into the difficulties process control users face when adding advanced control to their applications, and shows how gains APC provides will quickly fade if they aren't maintained.
Read the article
-- Control
Chemical control videos
The Process Automation and Control webpage at the larger AIChE website hosts dozens of videos and articles on advanced control, simulation, modeling and other subjects. Fortunately, a search box just below the title makes it easy to find the topic you're seeking.
Watch the videos
-- AIChE
Enhanced modeling paper
"Improvement in the Performance of Online Control Applications via Enhanced Modeling Techniques" is a 27-page, acdemic-style paper by Nunzio Bonavita, Riccardo Martini and Ted Matsko, all of ABB. Originally produced in 2003, the paper presents many of the essential issues of APC and modeling.
Read the paper
-- ABB
APC, SIS at an ammonia plant
This 20-minute video, “Advanced Process Control (APC) and Safety Instrumented System (SIS) in an Ammonia Plant," is delivered by Vivek Gupta, head of instrumentation, DCM Shriram Ltd., as one of the presentations at a recent ARC Advisory Group event.
Watch the video
-- ARC Advisory Group
Don't fear advanced control
To dispel worries about using APC, Chemical Processing magazine recently published its "Overcome Fear of Advanced Process Control" cover article. In it, Perry Nordh of Honeyell Process Solutions explains how planning, implementation and maintenance of an APC strategy can improve plant efficiency and performance.
Read the article
-- Chemical Processing
System modeling, simulation
The 40-minute video, "System modeling and simulation," is part of a series on principles of engineering system design, and is presented by Dr. T. Asokan, Engineering Design Dept., Indian Institute of Technology Madras. It covers heuristic, mathematical, physical system and numerical modeling, dimensional analysis, and two types of simulation: time- and frequency-domain analysis.
Watch the video
-- Indian Institute of Technology Madras
You are a simulation
Nobel prizewinner and astrophysicist George Smoot presents "You're a simulation and physics can prove it," which is a 20-minute video on the implications of the universe's cosmic microwave background radiation and its structure. It's one of the famous Technology, Entertainment and Design (TED) Talks, though TED x Salford means it's an independently organized TED event.
See it here
-- TEDx Talks
