Programmable Control of a Chemical Reactor Using a Fault Tolerant Computer

This paper discusses the operation of a chemical reactor and particularly the need for highly reliable instrumentation and control for critical processes. It describes the use of fault tolerance for the computer control to provide a level of reliability previously unachievable with standard computer control systems. The provision of highly reliable interface equipment to the reactor itself is described and approaches are presented for solving the problem of faults in the sensors and actuators. The paper discusses a specific example chemical reactor and the benefits that are achievable using a fault tolerant control computer system.