The management and control of material flow forms the core of manufacturing execution systems (MES) in the petrochemical industry. The bottleneck in the application of MES is the ability to match the material-flow model with the production processes. A dynamic material-flow model is proposed in this paper after an analysis of the material-flow characteristics of the production process in a petrochemical industry. The main material-flow events are described, including the movement, storage, shifting, recycling, and elimination of the materials. The spatial and temporal characters of the material-flow events are described, and the material-flow model is con- structed. The dynamic material-flow model introduced herein is the basis for other subsystems in the MES. In addi- tion, it is the subsystem with the least scale in MES. The dynamic-modeling method of material flow has been ap- plied in the development of the SinoMES model. It helps the petrochemical plant to manage the entire flow infor- mation related to tanks and equipments from the aspects of measurement, storage, movement, and the remaining balance of the material. As a result, it matches the production process by error elimination and data reconciliation. In addition, it facilitates the integration of application modules into the MES and guarantees the potential develop- ment of SinoMES in future applications.
