Virtual instruments in refineries

Environmental quality monitoring must have large data acquisition and distribution systems for industrial plants. In particular, refineries must comply with government laws that enforce strict limits on product specifications and pollutant emissions, thus pushing them towards adopting increasingly efficient measurement and control policies to monitor these process variables. The article presents representative examples of the design of virtual sensors devoted to the monitoring of processes in oil refining. The examples were selected to outline different aspects of the design and application of virtual sensors.