RICHARD J CARTER
Electrician at Fuqua St, Houston, TX

6701223, Mar 2, 2004

Sep 11, 2000

09/659497

Richard G. Carter - Houston TX

Advantica, Inc. - Carlisle PA

G05D 1600

700301, 700299, 700304, 700281, 700282, 700289, 700 28, 700 46, 700 36, 702100, 702 45, 702 47, 137 8, 137 45, 137 47

Pipelines are controlled by specifying operations along them. Control specifies sequential control values defining operations at each station to control the pipeline state. The time-dependent state is determinable by software calculations using continuous measurements along the pipeline. Forecasted deliveries dictate that the current pipeline state must change by future time (T). Control sequences are determined at pipeline stations to exercise optimum pipeline control while achieving predetermined goals from the current state to a sustainable target state which supports future deliveries by simulating current pipeline states through time interval T, while satisfying time-dependent forecast deliveries. An initial computable control set is iteratively improved and evaluated by computing the gradient of pipeline operational cost, costs of missing target(s), and costs of violating constraints by solving an adjoint problem each time the simulation is made. The gradient information, using second-order approximations to the N-dimensional cost, rapidly produces optimizing solutions using an accelerated iteration.