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Transgender Woman Engineer

By Nicole Wittmer posted 09-06-2022 07:25 PM

  

I am a Woman that was born in the wrong body, but had that corrected. I am legally, anatomically, mentally and emotionally a Woman, and only identify as a Woman.

 

I am very different then the transgender women you find on the internet, most of them still have male autonomy and are prostitute or in porn.  I live my life as like most women. I am a God-fearing woman with good morals and values. I am a member of the Society of Petroleum Engineers, Women in Energy, Girls Inc. Catalyst.

 

Some folks think that because I became a girl I just to move to the front of the job candidate line. That is not the case. With the last name of Wittmer, I am use to being in the back of the line. I went to a top-notch engineering college. I worked at some top-notch companies and worked hard to get to the front. Because of my excellent job performance, I weathered cut backs and layoffs. So, I wish to be at the front of the candidate line because I have the best education, the best experience and the best references.

Before I became a woman, I was considered a passive engineer that is, I did exactly what I was assigned to do and nothing else. For example, if I were walking through the plant, I would not pay attention to anything that could be possibly failing.

After I became a woman, I am considered an Active engineer. That is when I see something bad, I do something to fix it.

Sunoco was the only company to hire me as a transgender woman and this is how I showed my thanks and sincere gratitude  

 

RE-Automation Project

Sunoco is the best companies I ever work for. My first assignment was that I over saw the re-automation of the refinery with a new Honeywell C200 system. Sunoco Philadelphia is the largest refinery on the east coast. The re-automation project included pneumatic controls, electronic controls, and other obsolete controls to a new Honeywell EXPERIAN system. Pneumatic valves were re fitted with electronic-pneumatic positioners. I was the site representee that oversaw our central engineering group and outside contractors. I created a project Gannt chart that conformed to Honeywell standard and distributed that to all on the project. I had weekly meeting with the group to go over what was done and what needed to be done. The project was done on time under budget.

 

Sunoco display slow load time

I became aware of a serious process control issue when we had a compressor failure and panel operators needed to perform rapid operation changes. There was a great deal of confusion and frustration when panel operators had to quick move from graphic to graphic quickly when the displays were loading slowly and hanging up. I began investigating this problem with the assistance of Honeywell technical support.  We took a deep dive into the hardware and software and discovered there was a problem with our graphics. Our process display graphics were loaded with shapes representing valves, process inputs and similar process control items. Each one of these shapes contained a great deal of process information such as deviation from setpoint and current configuration represented in various colors and sounds. All this information was contained in a visual basic nugget called a script holder and each graphic contained several script holders. Each shape would load information from one or more script holder and there were several script holders for other shapes. It was this process of loading information from script holder that caused the graphic display slowing load time. We redesigned the graphics displays and script holders and this solved the problem.

 

Sunoco mini trends

One of our areas at Sunoco refinery in Philadelphia Pa just upgraded from a TDC 3000 and legacy displays to a Honeywell C200. Their legacy process displays had an object known as the mini trend. Each trend can contain various process information such as pump, level, pressure etc. One could place several of these mini trends on a graphic display which were extremely helpful on process startups and shut downs. The new C200 Experion system they moved to did not have this. After investigating and experimenting I sent my work to one of our graphic display contractors. Our graphic display contractor came up with very similar mini trend that we approved of and came to our site for a showing. Everyone loved it and we soon implemented it. It became one of their most useful tools.

 

Sunoco distillation column flooding

When I was at Sunoco refinery in Philadelphia Pa. my position was a process control system engineer. We had advanced process control system engineers that did tuning of the process instrumentation. One day an operator told me that one of the loops would not say tuned.  So, I partnered up with an instrument technician and asked him to check the control valve to see of the bonnet was tightened too much. We found out that the stem was not closing all the way. We then planned and executed blocking out the valve and examined it. We discovered that the valve and line was a quarter filled with crude solids. We the examined the operation of the still and discovered that it was flooding. The reason why it was flooding was because we were purchasing opportunity priced crude and it had different operation parameters. Our refinery had been processing light sweet crude before the economic down turn and variations in the crude was causing flooding of the column.  We assemble a six-sigma team to device new instrument and control to handle a range of crude parameter.  We also evaded a potential catastrophe of a flood column.

Sunoco TEC2000 to C200 project

We began to have a hydrocarbon compressor fail due to backpressure. This was a major economic and ecological loss. The obsolete slow TDC2000 DCS was unable to react quick enough with the hayward compressor controller unable to prevent shutdown. We had recently shutdown another site with a newer C200 DCS system.  So, I submitted a scope to get that C200 and installed it in that area, but my project was first shot down because it did not meet their payback time schedule. Then I remember how the re-automation project was approved. I then resubmitted my scope on the basis of proving the current DCS being obsolete and for that reason it was approved. So, I took on the project and had to wear many hats that my experience supported. I created all the P&ID, loop sheets, motor control schematic’s, DCS configuration and programming. I also hired some contractors and managed the entire project. When I worked at Bechtel a project like this would be spread across a dozen engineers and would take at least three years to complete. I completed this project myself, turn key, in six months.

 

Sunoco line blockage in Cluas area

I became aware of an area shutdown due to some line blockages in the Claus sulfur recovery area. I learned that in the sulfur recovery process, the Claus used Dimethylamine in a reaction to remove the sulfur from the sour gas. I recalled from my time at Rohm & Haas that cross linker chemical we were developing use Dimethylamine with a acid to create a cross linker. This cross linker is a sticky crystal from Dimethylamine reaction. This reaction was caused by a reaction between the Dimethylamine and the acid in the sour gas. I informed management that they could not simply flush the lines out because and material left in the pipes would act as seeds to start a new reaction. I informed them that the lines had to be heated to high temperature to kill the seed. My suggestion was investigated and used and worked.

Sunoco C200 failure

We began to have system failures on our Honeywell C200 DCS. I was given the important project to lead an investigation group at Sunoco to identify and mitigate failure with our Honeywell C200 control system. Our system was a marriage between an Allen Bradley PLC and a Honeywell Experion system.  Our system was configured as a redundant system. This is when an error is detected in on a Honeywell PLC rack it would switch to the redundant stack. After a month of investigating power and grounding issues and system configuration issues we narrowed down to event. When an error is detected in the in one of the racks the PLC attempts to switch over to the spare rack, but our system could not detect a spare rack so it shut down. We nailed this down to the microprocessor bug in the Rockwell PLC controller. We had all our Rockwell PLC controllers replaced with upgraded system controllers and that solved are problem.

 

Several persons, at engineering conventions that I  shared my accomplishments with ask me what inspired me to accomplish some of these feats. For one, it is quite evident that before I removed my gender ball and chains, I had two major achievements in 30 years and after I became a woman, I became a better engineer and had many major achievements in less than 10 years. Another reason is my upbringing. I come from a family of Scandinavian Noritic and German lineage. My mom made us make up our beds and keep our room tidy. We could not wear and tattered underwear.  My mom would say if we were in a car accident and went to the hospital, what would people think of us. My dad never took off sick, our home inside and out was kept spic and span and that rubbed off on me. I make my bed every morning and I keep my home spic and span inside and out. 

 

Many oil and gas refineries have diversity hiring policies that include gender identity and expression (transgender) but only Sunoco walked the walk other just talk the talk.

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