A
high fidelity distributed
plant simulation technique includes a plurality of separate
simulation modules that may be stored and executed separately in different drops or computing devices. The
simulation modules communicate directly with one another to perform accurate simulation of a
plant, without requiring a centralized coordinator to coordinate the operation of the
simulation system. In particular, numerous simulation modules are created, with each simulation module including a model of an associated
plant element and these simulation modules are stored in different drops of a
computer network to perform distributed simulation of a plant or a portion of a plant. At least some of the simulation modules, when executing, perform
mass flow balances taking into account process variables associated with adjacent simulation modules to thereby assure pressure, temperature and flow balancing (i.e., conservation of
mass flow) through the entire
simulation system. In a dynamic situation, a transient
mass storage
relay technique is used to account for transient changes in mass flow through any non-storage devices being simulated by the simulation modules. Moreover, adjacent simulation modules located in different drops communicate directly with one another using a background
processing task, which simplifies communications between adjacent simulation modules without the need for a central coordinator.