The year we will stop building plants with 1960s automation technology #BigIdeas2017
You may be surprised to know many oil and gas production platforms, refineries, petrochemical complexes, chemical plants of all kinds, pulp and paper mills, pharmaceutical plants, steel mills, and critical infrastructure like power stations and water treatment plants are still being built using, in part, analog automation technology from the sixties. My big idea for 2017 #BigIdeas2017 is that it be the year when we instead build more digital plants. Imagine how much better these important plants could perform and how much safer they could become with digital technology. Think about it, digital technology has since long ago brought tremendous innovation in digital hardware and software for mobile telephony, photography, music and movies, mail, books, games, and maps etc. This in turn has brought new capabilities and new services digitally transforming how we make calls, take photos, collaborate on designs, how we pass time, find our way to new places and experiences, look up information, even make purchases and payments, and how we stay in touch with friends and family. Process automation is lagging in digital innovation and is seemingly immune to Moore’s law. Imagine the possibilities of a digital industrial revolution. To be fair, some operating companies are further ahead with digital technology than others. What’s going on? What’s going to change now? Here are my personal thoughts:
State of the Past
Plants are still being commissioned including analog "four to twenty milliamp" control signals introduced in the sixties. Indeed, the sensors measuring temperature pressure flow and level etc. have a microprocessor, the control system itself making the automatic decisions has microprocessors and computers too, even the valves throttling the flows have microprocessors. However, the signals between them are still mostly analog. It’s a like a smart phone that could only be used for making calls.
Importance of Automation
Industrial revolutions have been about power; steam, electricity, and computing power – but at the same time it is also about control and automation, staring from the centrifugal governor. Automatic control is critical to produce sufficient supplies for better life: food and water for growing populations, energy for future generations, light and power for developing countries, hygiene, clothing and the daily necessities for the expanding middle-class, medication for an aging population, and building materials to shelter all. We couldn’t have gotten this far without automation. We need better automation to bring it to more people. All while protecting the environment. It’s a great challenge but not insurmountable.
Abundance
The book Abundance: The future is better than you think explains how technology is a resource-liberating mechanism. It can make the once scarce the now abundant. Technology makes resources abundant by enabling accessibility. It points to networks, sensors, wireless communication, and the Internet of Things (IoT) among others as transformational technologies.
Digital Transformation of Plants
Technology and innovation enables new tools, and new tools make new practices. This is why digital transformation of how plants are built is so important: improved product quality, plant throughput, energy efficiency, productivity, safety, integrity, and availability as well as reduced maintenance cost and emissions. It requires more automation. This means plants have to be instrumented with more sensors, more valves, and other control elements. In our daily lives we see this trend in smart phones and cars. The most practical way to connect these sensors is to use industrial networks called “fieldbus” or industrial wireless instead of the analog signals from the sixties. Digital technology enables new innovative sensors and software somewhat reminiscent of smart phones, tablets, and apps to improve plant operation. Time synchronized digital networks allow plants to further improve operation. The possibilities are very exciting.
Inertia
The digital transformation of plant designs is a slow process. At first because digital networking of sensors and other instrumentation was new and untested, and the process industries are very conservative. The technology has since been proven. Initially the products had some teething problem but technology refinements and product conformance testing has overcome this. Early usability difficulties have been solved with human-centered design. Additionally, LinkedIn has become a support community for sharing of best practices for industrial networking not available or used by I&C engineers in the past. While fieldbus and wireless in the past was hampered by the practice of device manufacturers first developing devices with analog signals and then making a fully digital version as an afterthought, these manufacturers now make enchanted devices only available in a fieldbus or wireless version without the analog limitations. As we embark on the fourth industrial revolution (Industrie 4.0) and the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) the process industries are in a better position to benefit from Moore’s law thanks to greater use of digital technology.
Industry Leaders
Not all operating companies use analog signals for control. A few companies are ahead, already having adopted digital communication from the first meter for many of the sensors and actuators. This includes automation on modern production facilities such as Floating Liquefied Natural Gas (FLNG) vessels.
With IIoT, digital sensor networks play an even larger role, not just for control and safety but also using wireless sensors to monitor the condition and performance of process equipment to improve reliability and energy efficiency. See explanation and example in this video:
So, this could become a breakthrough year for digital plants. It would be very groovy. Well, that’s my personal opinion. If you are interested in how the digital ecosystem is transforming process automation click “Follow” by my photo to not miss future updates. Click “Like” if you found this useful to you and share it with others if you think it would be useful to them.
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7 年I've been hearing this 30 years, and evanglizing it for 25 years. When we introduced CIP at Rockell Automation, the demise of the venerable 4-20ma transmitter was just around the corner. Technology is an easy sell to the corporate technocrats, the tough sell is the plant owner who's career (and bonus) are riding on his plant's availability to make Product. If I had a nickel for every time I've heard, "I don't have the courage to change what isn't broke." I'd be retired.
Manufacturing IT, Laboratory , process automation systems & data Architect.
7 年Sorry but I couldnt resist challenging a few of the statements: "like a smart phone that could only be used for making calls." Still the most important app on a smartphone is making calls, and the calls app has only got worse and slower, with more dropped calls, with each generation of phone from what I can see.The main phone use case has not been improved by the clutter of apps.The older non smart phones with a keypad were arguably easier to use. Understand that the most critical design criterion for mission critical control systems is....reliability. We dont want Oil Platform control software that is "somewhat reminiscent of smart phones, tablets, and apps " to improve plant operation. Smartphone app design is about product market fit, time to market, revenue streams, continuously evolving functions, continuously crashing software. Im not seeing the comparison with control software here. Happily we have numerous coding safety standards that will prevent that. Technology as a resource liberating mechanism? Perhaps we can all share a car and sweat the asset more. But technology concentrates wealth and thus contributes to inequality. Factory and software automation means the cost of a large portion of manufactured goods is tending to decrease over time but we will have less money , so forget about abundance. On networked equipment in plants; So nothing new here then. Even before fieldbus , companies such as SattControl / Alfalaval were networking valves in dairies via coax cable. 30 years ago. Devicenet has been popular for a similar purpose for 20 years. Sharing of best practices?? When it comes down to it, there is minimal sharing of the most important knowledge between the programming of Siemens, Emerson, Rockwell,Yokagowa etc.Its simply not in their interest. They like vendor lock-in. I dont see any free Emerson deltaV courses online, or any free DCS or even PLC control module class libraries to download (except OSCAT). This is where the real saving is; When someone gives you a library of pretested and 'debugged in the field' modules. Have you ever used stackoverflow? Its brilliant and a life saver for coding. There is nothing like that for process automation. Ever used pluralsight.com for IT training from the best programmers out there? Theres nothing like that for process automation. Dont underestimate vendor lock-in. Big companies only buy from big companies, and most importantly , its nothing to do with the tech but everything to do with keeping the business making money. Yes new industries (like windpower for example) are not shackled by outdated legacy system attitudes and yes they adopt new tech. But replacing old but nevertheless reliable tech with unproven tech is a fools errand. Actual conversation from an Automation vendor sales engineer to a multi national drug company: Automation sales engineer:"..but our new platform has this capability and that widget, and these gizzmos are really shiny" Customer: "we make drugs. We make a lot of money making drugs. I dont give a **** about your new platform except for one thing. Can you import the library from the last platform you sold me, because i want to be making drugs asap" Sales Engineer:"Well...we have moved to a fully object oriented model now so we are going to have to redevelop the whole thing" Customer: "Get Out"
Founder Director Indcon Engineering Consultants Pvt LTD Instrumentation Engineering Design and Automation Consultants
7 年It sounds like spending for BUNGALOW and getting a HUT
Experienced Advanced Control and Monitoring Solutions Expertise across Multiple Industries. ( Avid Fly Fishing Aficionado)
7 年Great article Jonas. I realize that there are many possibilities with the ever increasing abundance of sensors with really great applications for both better control and safety and as you so aptly pointed out and of course they are not 10 dollar items.In the control rooms of the past there were CR operators and field operators. There were also unit process engineers on duty to assists with the special problems that can crop up. Today that same plant runs with fewer personal in the control rooms.Field operators are almost a thing of the past as operating companies want every one in a safe place.Certainly this is all well and good and rather than have someone walk around to check a few local instruments we could place a few more sensors around that heat exchanger and even place a camera on specific /critical pieces of equipment such as the slide valves on a FCC reactor. It is humanly not possible to read all the IOT articles that pop up on "in" which are mostly very superficial. I do see the great value of extra data and I am sure that engineers will be able to build more knowledge based systems and DSS systems that can process the data and then provide the operations team with answers. Certainly the black book designs from the licensors will also adapt the this new technology.My concern as someone who has started up and operated plants is not how many sensors we can install and how many applications we can design , but rather how much information can we process as humans and how vulnerable we may become when they fail.
AI in Manufacturing Podcast Host | Sr. Industry Solutions Advocate @ HiveMQ | Founder @ Industry40.tv
7 年"It’s a like a smart phone that could only be used for making calls." That is so profound.