Control System World

Yokogawa Electric Corporation announces that it has signed a contract with Dell Inc. for the global provision of PC models that are selected and customized for Yokogawa use. Under this contract, which was signed on August 20, Yokogawa will offer high-quality system solutions that utilize Dell PCs and Yokogawa industrial automation (IA) system-related products.

High performance PCs that incorporate the latest technologies are being used more and more in the control systems field, for example, by replacing the dedicated terminals used as human machine interfaces and to connect with host systems. However, while a production control system usually remains in use for a period of one to two decades or even longer, new PC hardware, operating systems, and application software incorporating the latest technologies and offering ever higher levels of performance are continually being released. While incorporating this new PC hardware and software in a control system, the control system supplier must take care to ensure that the overall system continues to meet the highest quality standards. To satisfy this need and offer quality system solutions, Yokogawa has concluded this contract with Dell for the supply of dedicated Yokogawa PC models.

Under the terms of the contract, Dell will supply PCs that have been tested to verify their compatibility with Yokogawa products. Yokogawa will globally distribute these PCs as Yokogawa Certified Models for use with its industrial automation system-related products*. These are "long-life products" that will remain available for twice as long as equivalent commercial off-the-shelf products. To meet a variety of operating conditions and installation requirements, they will be available in a rack-mount or desktop configuration with either a server or client operating system.

Kepware Technologies, a software development company focused on communications for automation, announced today that Cascades Tissue Group has implemented KEPServerEX and LinkMaster to improve connectivity across its diverse and sprawling infrastructure. Since adopting Kepware's communication solutions, Cascades Tissue Group has improved connectivity between modern and legacy machines, and increased operational efficiency by more than 5 percent.

Upholding a fifty-year commitment to environmentally-friendly practices, Cascades regularly repurposes or reuses aging machinery. To ensure that its recycled architecture operates efficiently, Cascades relies on a modern Manufacturing Execution System (MES) to facilitate the delivery of the right information to the right place at the right time. This sophisticated MES requires a flexible and reliable communication solution.

After experimenting with a number of well-known disparate communication solutions, Cascades found Kepware's KEPServerEX communications platform and LinkMaster bridging tool. Using KEPServerEX enables Cascades to support communications across all of its seventeen plants, seventeen paper machines, and nearly ninety converting lines with just one piece of software. With its support of the OPC standard and more than 150 protocols, KEPServerEX allows Cascades to communicate with virtually any machine on its plant floor. By implementing the communications platform, Cascades has eliminated numerous disparate devices and is now polling more than 11,000 tags from nearly 500 PLCs using a single server.

"Kepware allows us to easily and effectively facilitate the communications that drive our MES initiative," said Benoit Lapensée, Engineer and MES Coordinator, Cascades. "After expending time and resources trying to cobble together different communications solutions, finding one piece of highly intuitive software that could get all of our machines talking was just what the doctor ordered."

When its manufacturing facilities are operating more efficiently, Cascades is operating more responsibly. According to Lapensée, "Kepware is truly at the heart of a wildly successful MES program, helping us in our ongoing mission to develop great paper products in a responsible way."

Technip has been awarded a substantial (1) EPIC (2) lump sum contract by BP Trinidad and Tobago LLC for the development of the Juniper project, to be located off the South East coast of Trinidad.

The scope of work consists of design, detailed engineering, procurement, construction, load out and mechanical completion of:

4,300 short ton topsides that can process 590 million standard cubic feet per day (MMSCFD) of gas, 6,100 short ton jacket.

The contract will also cover the design, detailed engineering, procurement, fabrication, transport, installation and pre-commissioning of:

• 5 off, 10” and 8” internal diameter flexible flowlines,

• 26” outside diameter , 10km concrete coated rigid subsea pipeline,

• an extensive diving campaign to support clients LNG train and field turnaround,

• large number of subsea structures and tie-in spools.

Additionally, it includes the transport and installation of client supplied umbilicals, trees and flying leads.  Technip's operating center in Houston, Texas, USA, will perform the overall design, detailed engineering and project management. Offshore installation is scheduled for the second half of 2016.

National content is of strategic importance to Technip. Platform fabrication will be performed in Trinidad using a local fabricator. Technip will bring its worldwide fabrication competencies and expertise to this project. The flexible pipes will be manufactured at Technip's Flexi France facility in Le Trait, France. Technip’s S-Lay pipelay vessel, the G-1200, will install the rigid pipelines. Additional vessels from Technip's fleet will install the flexibles as well as umbilicals, and provide construction work support.

Following the FEED support, project planning and detailed engineering work, in which Technip and its subsidiary Genesis have been involved for almost a year, this award validates the Group’s strategy of early involvement to design an effective project execution plan.

ICONICS is pleased to announce the release of its version 10.85 products! This new release is packed with over 500 new features including new project documentation / reporting, new Web-based Pack-and-Go, compliance with multiple data sources (including VMware, OPC UA, BACnet and SNMP v3), and WebHMI Bulk Publishing. These important, time-saving features and productivity tools were created to help users become more efficient than ever before.

GENESIS64™ v10.85, HMI/SCADA and visualization suite of automation software products, is packed with over 500 new features. A few of the new major features include:

New Project Documentation & Reporting

New Web-based Pack and Go

VMware, OPC UA, BACnet and SNMP v3 Compliance

WebHMI Bulk Publishing

New in Energy AnalytiX® v10.85 are Energy Star reports and one-click, quick connect meters for Mitsubishi, Measurlogic and Eaton. Additional energy meters will be added this year. Overall improvements in ease of use, configuration, performance and reliability were achieved. The new and improved Energy AnalytiX Viewer supports several preconfigured chart types and greatly enhanced usability.

Facility AnalytiX® offers a new Rules Engine with over 300 fault rules for popular building equipment, mass import configuration capabilities and a number of usability improvements. The newest features available with version 10.85 save you time by making things easier, faster, and more intuitive.

New for Quality AnalytiX® is a histogram chart that visualizes the density of data for a given distribution. Users can set and color code upper and lower specification limits, as well as upper and lower reasonable limits to identify how much of the data is within or beyond these limits.

New innovations in MobileHMI™ v10.85 enable device- and resolution-independent responsive designs, making it easier to provide a clean experience on all devices without incurring the extra cost of development time. Additionally, mobile templates and the ability to target specific devices with displays make MobileHMI ready to handle any composition of devices.

New for v10.85, Hyper Historian™ for Azure provides the ability to collect data from any device and securely stream it to the cloud for long-term storage and analysis. Hyper Historian’s Cloud Collector serves as the on premise appliance to store and forward data from the plant floor to a public or private cloud. Combine that with the new Hyper to Hyper technology to enable users to aggregate and merge data from any plant historian server, on premises or in the cloud.

Yokogawa Electric Corporation announces that its subsidiary Yokogawa de Mexico, S.A. de C.V. has received an order from Cobra Instalaciones Mexico S.A. de C.V., a subsidiary of the Spanish EPC firm ACS, to supply an integrated control and safety instrumented system solution for an ultra-low-sulfur diesel fuel plant that is being built for PEMEX Refinacion, a subsidiary of Mexico's national oil company, PEMEX.

To reduce air pollution caused by emissions of sulfur oxide, nitrogen oxide, and particulate matter, PEMEX is promoting the use of low-sulfur diesel fuel and gasoline. This project involves the construction of an ultra-low-sulfur diesel fuel plant at the PEMEX Cadereyta refinery complex, which is located in Nuevo Leon state in northeastern Mexico. The new plant will produce ultra-low-sulfur diesel fuel from naphtha purified at the Cadereyta refinery. This facility will have the capacity to produce 35,000 barrels per day of this desulfurized fuel, and is scheduled to come online in the first half of 2017.

For the monitoring and control of this plant's hydrodesulfurization unit and sulfur recovery unit, Yokogawa will deliver the CENTUM® VP integrated production control system, the STARDOM® network-based control system, the ProSafe®-RS safety instrumented system for shutting down the plant under abnormal conditions, the Exaquantum™ plant information management system and other solution-based software packages, the GC8000 process gas chromatograph for analyzing gas composition, and a variety of field instruments for flow measurement. Yokogawa de Mexico will be responsible for installation and engineering, and will also provide support with commissioning and the training of plant operators. Installation of these systems and products is scheduled to be completed by the first half of 2015.

Mexico is rich in oil and natural gas resources, and recently has confirmed the presence of shale oil and gas deposits. Investments by companies in the private sector, including overseas-based enterprises, for the development of Mexico's oil and gas resources, are expected to be approved and investment in this field is expected to increase. And in line with the rising awareness around the world of the need to protect the environment, an increase in demand for the sulfur removal facilities, particularly in developing nations, is foreseen. Yokogawa anticipates continued growth in the Mexican control systems business, and will aggressively pursue additional control system orders for sulfur removal facilities that contribute to preventing air pollution and thereby help to protect the environment.

Engineering and project services company Clough Limited today announced the acquisition of Booth Welsh, a privately owned engineering services company headquartered in Ayrshire, Scotland.

Booth Welsh specialises in the provision of electrical, instrumentation and automation design, process consultancy, project management, implementation and commissioning services. Established in 1989 by John Welsh, the company employ around 250 personnel, with the majority of the workforce comprising qualified engineers and designers. Booth Welsh services clients in the Oil & Gas, Life Sciences, Petrochemical, Chemicals, Nuclear, Utilities, and Food & Beverage industries.

The acquisition follows the establishment of Clough’s engineering centre in Glasgow earlier this year.

Clough’s CEO and Managing Director Kevin Gallagher said the circa £9 million (A$16 million) acquisition brings complementary skills and significantly strengthens its service offering to clients.

“Booth Welsh will become a centre for highly specialised electrical, instrumentation and automation design. The Company’s controls and asset management capability will enhance Clough’s operations and maintenance services, while their specialisation in control system design will assist the CloughCoens commissioning business in Korea with design, delivery and commissioning activities.”

Booth Welsh’s Managing Director Martin Welsh said he was looking forward to the opportunities this transaction would bring.

“As part of Clough, Booth Welsh will access larger scopes of work in our current market sectors, while expanding our Oil & Gas business globally. We will draw on Clough’s strong engineering and project management capabilities to provide a comprehensive suite of engineering and design services to our clients.”

In its upgrade to Version 8.1, the Siemens Industry Automation Division has equipped its Simatic PCS 7 process control system with 70 technical innovations. These will improve user-friendliness, performance and efficiency of the process control system from Siemens throughout the entire lifecycle of process engineering plants, from planning to maintenance. Configuration engineers benefit from more efficient engineering tools, operating personnel from enhanced convenience in their daily work, and operating companies from higher plant availability and lower total operating costs.

Two examples of more efficient engineering with Simatic PCS 7 V8.1 are selective loading of program codes and the "Type Change in Run" functionality. When selectively loading program codes into the automation systems, configuration engineers can now specifically load their individual changes. This eliminates the coordination work otherwise required within the project team, therefore making commissioning more flexible and considerably more efficient. With the new Simatic PCS 7 CPU 410, "Type Change in Run" also affords engineering enhancements, i.e. updates of individual blocks can now be loaded without having to set the automation system to "stop". This is an advantage in the event of version updates in the opera-ting phase, for example when expanding the functionality of an existing motor block.

Advanced Process Graphics provides greater ease of operation, cutting the daily workload of operating teams. Previously available as an optional module, and included in the control system's standard variant as from Version 8.1, the visualization contained in Advanced Process Graphics focuses on consistent use of discreet colors, simple shapes and unambiguous symbol language in the operating screens. Processed plant data in the form of hybrid displays, trend curves and spider diagrams simplify the work of the operators. Important trends in production processes are displayed and overall relationships are reliably visualized. With increasing complexity and extended classical operator control tasks, this facilitates the daily work of operators.

The system expansion card (SEC) for the Simatic PCS 7 CPU 410, the new MPC 10x10 block and new condition monitoring blocks, for example, stand for higher availability, boosted performance and lower overall operating costs with Simatic PCS 7 V8.1. With the system expansion card for Simatic PCS 7 CPU 410, the controller's performance is adjusted exactly to the respective automation task. Without restarting the automation system, users can increase the number of process objects with additionally required performance, for example. There is no need to plan for safety reserves and companies operating the systems save on investment costs. As a model-based predictive controller, the new MPC 10x10 block can control up to ten manipulated variables and controlled variables. With it, sophisticated multi-variable control tasks and even higher-grade control tasks can be implemented with ease, for example operating whole distillation columns with maximum product yield and use of energy. The new condition monitoring blocks in Upgrade V8.1 monitor mechanical components such as pumps or valves for correct operation. Condition monitoring concepts can therefore be integrated directly into the control system with a uniform look and feel. Thus, operating companies gain valuable information about the condition of their plants, avoid unscheduled outages, and additionally save on energy costs through monitoring and optimum operation of their components.

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Exida, a global supplier of functional and process safety products, services, and certifications has released CyberPHAx™, a tool that allows users to effectively conduct a Cyber Risk Assessment to identify potential cyber-attacks and to document existing or planned countermeasures to estimate residual risk of a cyber-attack.

“We live in an increasingly connected world, where it is now possible for a person behind a PC to take over a plant’s control system with ill intent,” says Iwan van Beurden, exida’s director of product development. “CyberPHAx provides the ability to thoroughly conduct a Cyber Risk Assessment allowing you to identify potential weaknesses in your existing infrastructure and plan for additional countermeasures if necessary.”

CyberPHAx™ is a Process Hazards Analysis (PHA) tool tool that can be used by engineering personnel in project, process safety, information technology, and process control, as well as plant management, and operations personnel.

CyberPHAx™guides users through the Cyber Risk Assessment process, effectively focusing the user on the task at hand, identifying types of cyber-attacks, potentially leading to hazardous events and their associated risks. Once the severity of a potential cyber-attack is understood, existing or planned countermeasures can be documented allowing an estimate of residual risk. If the tolerable risk target is not met, recommendations can be documented to lower the risk to a tolerable level.