AIChE 2026 Annual Meeting — Peer-Reviewed Paper
Revolutionizing Process Control: The Transformative Role of Open Process Automation
How OPA enables high-frequency MPC execution within the deterministic control domain — and what that means for fired heaters, advanced control, and the architecture decisions you are making now.
About This Paper
Presented at the American Institute of Chemical Engineers 2026 Annual Meeting, this paper examines the architectural foundations of Open Process Automation and demonstrates how O-PAS enables a new class of advanced and high-frequency control applications that are impractical or impossible in conventional DCS architectures.
What This Paper Covers
- Why traditional DCS architectures fragment advanced control and introduce the supervisory gap
- How OPA decouples control applications from proprietary execution environments while preserving determinism
- High-frequency control applications enabled by OPA, from constraint enforcement at 10–500 ms to AI-assisted control at 50–1000 ms
- A fired heater MPC case example: sub-second execution within a Distributed Control Node, 15–25% reduction in fuel consumption variability
- Multi-unit deployment results: 40% reduction in engineering hours through portable control application modules
- Implementation considerations for multi-vendor integration, workforce transition, and validation
Who This Is For
- Lead control engineers evaluating MPC architecture options
- VPs of Operations and Engineering assessing DCS end-of-life decisions
- Process engineers in refining, petrochemical, and continuous manufacturing
- Automation architects responsible for long-term control system strategy
Peer-reviewed • Vendor-neutral • Presented at AIChE 2026 Annual Meeting • Author: Trevor Cusworth, CSI
Download the Paper
Peer-reviewed • O-PAS aligned • No spam
15–25%
Reduction in fuel consumption variability in fired heater applications
100–500 ms
MPC execution cycle within a Distributed Control Node under OPA
40%
Reduction in engineering hours through portable control application modules
Work With CSI
From assessment to operating reality.
CSI works with operators at every stage of the Open Process Automation decision — from a first complimentary assessment to full implementation. Start where you are.