The combined impact of new technology and globalisation are among a variety of issues that will buffet New Zealand’s process control industry over the next few years, and the Institute of Measurement and Control will have its hands full helping industry weather the storm.

That’s the view of the IMC’s new president, Jim Neville. A member since 1994 (and vice-president for the past seven years), Neville was elected at the IMC’s AGM in November last year and succeeds Brent Fernandez (president 1987 – 2001). We caught up with Neville soon after his appointment.

ET: The Measurement and Control industry seems to be in an unprecedented phase of change. What’s behind it? How’s it affecting local industry?

JN: “These are indeed volatile times, and there are a number of inter-related issues at play. A major one is the impact of new technologies and operating philosophies on the traditional process control sector – specifically, on its personnel. We are witnessing a shrinking control industry. The exclusive use of traditional process control specialists is a fading philosophy – it’s being superceded by a ‘blending of personnel’ – people with different, multiple or generalist skills.

“Consider the involvement of IT personnel in process control, for example. It’s mainly because of control systems migrating to LAN/WAN enterprise systems, as well as the growing role of the Internet and Ethernet in modern plants. Control communication systems have become more ‘open’ and less proprietary. There’s a lot of discussion and apprehension in the industry about the security and access issues, but like it or not, it’s a growing trend, and we need to adapt to it and accommodate it.

“In parallel with that development is industry’s growing use of industrial electrical technicians rather than instrumentation technicians – not only in terms of fitting new equipment, but also for maintenance. In some respects, this is happening because instrumentation has become far more reliable and doesn’t require the regular maintenance it did in the past. But it’s also compounded by a shift in training and education. With universities and polytechs now offering degree courses, students are less inclined to enrol for the traditional technician courses. We find ourselves with more supervisors and less hands-on people.

“A similar adjustment is occurring in the control and relief valve sector, where the maintenance of equipment is increasingly falling to personnel with broad mechanical skills rather than specialist valve expertise. And of course, in some applications, the evolution of new technologies such as on-line analysers with their self-diaganostic capabilities, has decreased – but not removed –  the need for specialist staff somewhat. Maintenance and analysis of equipment is no longer as labour-intensive as it used to be.

“Another trend impacting on traditional control and instrumentation staff is that of outsourcing. Modern management trends relate to reducing overheads by switching to contract staff and cutting back on permanent, in-house staff. This also allows many organisations to shift compliance issues on to the contractor.

“So collectively, all of these developments are changing the nature of how the industry functions, and the IMC must adapt its role to cater for the changes. At the end of day,  process control is still the most critical issue affecting the reliability of the plant and the  quality and variability of the end-product. The way it is tackled may change, but it remains a vital component of the processing industry.”

ET: The last few years have been marked by a flurry of mergers and acquisitions in the process control industry on a global scale. How will these developments affect industry, as well as the local suppliers and vendors?

JN: “In a number of ways. For a start, the fact that there are now only a few major measurement and control manufacturers - Invensys, Emerson, ABB, Tyco and Yokogawa, for example - means fewer choices and less competition. But you could also argue that some rationalisation is good for the industry – that there were too many different technologies fighting for the same market share.

“Perhaps most significantly, however, the mergers may impact on end-users that have already invested in equipment. With their supplier absorbed into another company, they may find support for their particular installation severely curtailed. Worse, it may disappear altogether.

“Of course, mergers and acquisitions also impact on the subsidiaries and representative in this country. They might suddenly find they no longer have a product – with fairly dire consequences.  So it impacts on the vendor’s job security.

“There’s also a flip-side to the equation. The merger syndrome is also taking place locally, which reduces the market for process control vendors. Look at the dairy industry. A few years ago there were about 15 milk products manufacturers. We now have three, and the largest represents about 98% of the market.”

ET: Environmental legislation such as the RMA already influences the process control operations of many organisations, and it’s likely the restrictions may become tighter if New Zealand adopts the Kyoto Protocol.  Is there a role for the IMC as a sort of sounding board facility for industry and, perhaps more importantly, for Government?

JN: “Definitely. The IMC is already involved in this way, and is a member of the National Network of Technologists operating under the auspices of IPENZ. The Network was established as an independent expert body the Government can use to test and discuss a wide range of policies.

“New Zealand’s possible ‘early adoption’ of the Kyoto Protocol is, I think, one of the most disturbing issues facing industry – and the IMC needs to play a support role. All the major energy users are big process control users, and the impact of conditions under ‘Kyoto Protocol legislation’ would be severe. Particularly if we are the only country complying – any competitive edge we may have now would disappear. As an impartial body, the IMC would play an important role in verifying the accuracy of monitoring processes in terms of environmental impacts and so on.

“I think we are all subjected to a lot of misinformation about the dangers of climate change, and any serious instrumentation and measurement professional should read Lonberg’s book (Sceptical Environmentalists by Bjorn Londberg) for a balanced view. It should also be compulsory reading for our Government.

ET: Where to from here? How will the IMC address these issues?

JN: “There is no simple, single strategy – it will have to been a multi-facetted approach. We will attempt to interpret and reflect on what is happening in the process control sector, so that our members are able to make informed decisions, and stay abreast with emerging trends and technologies more easily.

“We will continue providing broad-based skills support, using tools such as seminars and workshops, and there appears to be a particular need in the short term to focus on safety instrumented systems. The seminars and workshops will also explore the use of  diagnostic functions in control valves, instruments and variable speed drives, and there is a great need for support in the integrating of different, multiple fieldbus protocols.

“To reiterate my earlier point: the way process control is implemented in the future may change – but it remains a vital component of the processing industry It’s up to us to facilitate the changes”.

A marked shift to the use of TCP/IP and embedded web technologies in programmable controllers will be among the most dominant process control developments over the next few years.

This trend, says Dirk Rouffaer, Schneider Electric’s Product Marketing Manager, Transparent Factory (USA), reflects industry’s rapidly-evolving information requirements, and is designed to provide seamless communication between automation, manufacturing and business systems.

His views were echoed by a number of speakers at November’s Control 2001 event. Other predictions for the future of automation and control include a sharper focus on advanced functionality (for improved diagnostics), open communication protocols and asset management software.

“Much of these developments are being driven,” says Rouffaer, “by the need for all personnel to make use of real-time information at plant level. Traditionally, such information has been confined to the factory floor in devices such as PLCs, installed I/O and workstations.”

His views focus on the increased use of embedded web servers as standard interfacing mechanism, and system-wide access via Browsers. But in addition to the ‘Ethernet Everywhere’ phenomenon, he sees a greater adoption of wireless networks, an increased evolution of PC-Based Control and HMIs, with the trend to rented (run on demand) software.

Other trends likely to make a mark are the shift to plant floor/ERP integration, the greater adaptation of highly-distributed Smart instruments and controllers, as well as the emergence of open systems (such as SOAP, XML and OLE). “Proprietary is dead,” insists Rouffaer. “The fieldbus war is over.”

On a similar crystal-ball gazing theme, Shaun Taylor (Senior Business Development Manager at Emerson Process Management - Singapore), believes advanced functionality and engineering best practices will provide the next generation of safety and availability improvements.

“The international process control arena is experiencing a dramatic evolution in maintenance philosophy with smarter instrumentation – shifting away from reactive and preventative schedules toward predictive strategies.”

Reactive and preventative schedules are both flawed, he says. “A reactive approach – fix it when it breaks – results in unscheduled shutdowns, so reliability suffers. The preventative approach relies on regularly scheduled maintenance, but is usually a waste of resources, and the operators are still at the mercy of unscheduled failures.”
The predictive strategy, by contrast, is geared to fixing the equipment just before it breaks, and that maximises process uptime, minimises maintenance costs. In the predictive maintenance scenario, diagnostics are paramount.

The emergence of the Asset Management trend was the focus of the presentation by Rockwell Automation’s Michael Cahill (Australia manager of the organisation’s Manufacturing Business Systems).

“The e-Business economy,” he says, “is forcing dramatic changes in manufacturing, and the philosophy is encapsulated in the following profile – build-to-order, deliver with speed and accuracy, minimize cycle times, and maximise efficiency.”

Central to this strategy is reliably-centered maintenance (RCM) – a process for determining the maintenance requirements of any physical asset in its operating context.
“It’s benefits, says Cahill, “include an enhanced understanding of how the asset works, a better understanding of how the asset can fail together with the root causes of each failure, a list of proposed maintenance tasks and improved team working.”

Specific advantages, he adds, include greater safety and environmental protection, improved operating performance, greater maintenance cost effectiveness, longer useful life of expensive items and a comprehensive maintenance database.

The release of Flexible Function Blocks (FFBs) and FISCO specifications in September last year, as well as the establishment of a Host Interoperability Support Test (HIST) were among Foundation Fieldbus’ most significant advances in recent months.

Outlining these developments at Control 2001, Foundation Fieldbus president Richard Timony said FFBs were a key component of an open, fieldbus architecture for information integration.

“Application-specific FFBs enable complex control strategies such as supervisory data acquisition, batch control, PLC sequencing, burner management, coordinated drive control and I/O interfacing. They allow integration of systems across the plant enterprise, and extend the Function Block Model for complex Discrete/Batch/Hybrid Applications.”

The development of FFBs, he said, allowed end users to integrate logic into their open fieldbus architecture, and achieve true, plantwide distributed control. “They are now able to achieve seamless, enterprise-wide information integration via a common function block model, and reduce the number of different automation systems that must be supported.”

The Fieldbus Intrinsically Safe Concept (which has now  been added to physical layer profile) is applicable to intrinsically safe (IS) hazardous areas. The model was developed by Germany’s PTB-Braunschweig, in accord with Cenelec and IEC 1158-2 guidelines.

FISCO, says Timony, “increases the number of devices per barrier in EX Zone 1 hazardous areas, and also increases the number of devices per H1 segment and simplifies intrinsic safety conformity evaluations.”

Foundation Fieldbus’ initiation of the Host Interoperability Support Test (HIST) is designed to verify support of FF-defined host features, and assures users that hosts incorporate FF functionality. Host systems that have already completed HIST are:

· Yokogawa (CENTUM CS/CS1000/CS3000 fieldbus tool)
· Smar (System 302 configuration tool)
· Emerson Process Management (DeltaV control system)
· ABB (Industrial IT control System)
· Invensys
· Honeywell (Plantscape)

Caption (rich1): Foundation Fieldbus president Richard Timony updates conference delegates with the technology’s latest developments.

‘Multivariable control’ sounds like a contradiction in terms, but Hamilton’s PavTech NZ Ltd insists the principle delivers substantial process improvements.

In a paper delivered at Control 2001, Dr Peter Bollenbeck (senior APC Engineer at PavTech), said the extensive benefits of multivariable control, model-predictive software arise from the transmission of dynamic and steady state optimum setpoints to single loop controllers.

“That means external disturbances are efficiently rejected. Unlike single control loops that carry out single tasks such as regulating flow or temperature, multivariable control recognises the simultaneous importance of many single loops on the overall optimum performance of a process.”

Bollenbeck illustrated his discussion with a case study at dairy giant Anchor Products, where multivariable control resulted in a 50% reduction in moisture variation. It also assisted by improved evaporator control.

Additional optimisation benefits included the control of cyclone blockages, throughput maximization (which depends on milk volumes and processing demand) and much better level control.

W. Arthur Fisher’s FactoryCast – a Premium or Quantum PLC module for improved factory control monitoring and remote administration – received the IMC’s Most Innovative Product Award at the Control 2001 dinner in Auckland late last year.

Observers say the technology reflects industry’s steady trend toward open, browser-based access to plant floor information.

FactoryCast has an embedded HTTP server as well as Ethernet TCP/IP connectivity. It also has its own memory and file system for delivering real-time data to the web.

Using secured hyperlinks, it channels the right data to those who need it for more complete reference information, such as machine drawings and procedural instructions.

Web functions include access to the controller’s web page with standard browsers plus the ability to log into pre-configured device diagnostics, I/O configurations, online data templates and library tools.

Other winners at Control 2001 were:

· Best Trainee Award - Hayden Manning (Western Institute of Technology – Taranaki)
· Most Significant Foundation Fieldbus Project 2001 - Project Manukau (Watercare Services, Auckland)
· Most Innovative DeviceNet Project 2001 - Carter Holt Harvey Tissue Plant, Hamilton
· Best Stand Control 2001 - Prosol Ltd