PACE - Process & Control Engineering - June 2013

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JUNE 2013 | VOL.66 NO.5

PACE E marks 60 years For six decades now, PACE E magazine has been an integral part of Australia’s process control and automation community. Tell us your story editor@pacetoday.com.au

Post Print Approved PP255003/00539

INSIDE PACE

Nominations

Water Management

Profile

Check out some of the entries received for the 2013 PACE Zenith Awards

Water utility rolls out scalable solution to track chemical and power usage

Rafael Koenig is the Chairman of Profibus and Profinet Australia

www.uke.com.au

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CONTENTS

Associate Publisher: Martin Sinclair Email: martin.sinclair@cirrusmedia.com.au Editor: Kevin Gomez Tel: (02) 8484 0976 Fax: (02) 8484 0722 Email: kevin.gomez@cirrusmedia.com.au Deputy Editor: Isaac Leung Tel: (02) 8484 0956 Email: isaac.leung@cirrusmedia.com.au

IN THIS ISSUE

Group Sales Manager: Tim Richards Tel: (02) 8484 0829 Mobile: 0420 550 799 Email: tim.richards@cirrusmedia.com.au QLD Sales Manager: Sharon R. Amos PO Box 3136, Bracken Ridge, QLD 4017 Tel: (07) 3261 8857 Fax: (07) 3261 8347 Mobile: 0417 072 625 Email: sharon.amos@cirrusmedia.com.au

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Graphic Designer: Nicolle Lawson Email: nicolle.lawson@cirrusmedia.com.au Production Co-ordinator: Tracy Engle Tel: (02) 8484 0707 Fax: (02) 8484 0722 Email: tracy.engle@cirrusmedia.com.au

06 SUBSCRIPTION: $99 pa incl GST OVERSEAS SUBSCRIPTIONS: NZ: $A109 pa & OS: $A119 pa CUSTOMER SERVICE: 1300 360 126

Cirrus Media Tower 2, Level 3, 475 Victoria Ave, Chatswood, NSW 2067, Australia Locked Bag 4700 Chatswood Delivery Centre, NSW 2067, Australia Phone: 02 8484 0888 Fax: 02 8484 0633 ABN 80 132 719 861 ISSN 1329-6221 www.cirrusmedia.com.au © Copyright Cirrus Media, 2013

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News Analysis 6

Case Study 13

Technology Review 22

OpsManage 2013 Invensys takes its user conference to the west for the first time with the theme Engage:Envision:Empower

Clear view on water A Council wass drowning in data from its SCADA system d a production d i until it developed intelligence solution

Intrusion prevention Attackers are zeroing in on wireless devices and exploiting h to gain i entry to networks k them and access sensitive information

IICA Corner 9

Nominations 17

Application Update 25

Institute marks 70 Charting the IICA’s growth from modest beginnings in 1943 to a well-represented national body today

PACE Zenith Awards A look at some of the excellent people and projects entered into this year’s Awards programme.

There’s more online

Mining automation Reliable communications between PLCs and HMIs are absolutely critical in remote mining operations

ON THE COVER

OFFICIAL MAGAZINE OF:

Average Net Distribution Period ending September ‘12 6,599

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JUNE 2013 www.pacetoday.com.au 03

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COMMENT

EDITOR’S MESSAGE

WHAT’S ON

IICA Technology Expo 12 June 2013, Bairnsdale events@iica.org.au

Manufacturing: evolve to survive

2013 PACE Zenith Awards Gala Dinner 13 June 2013, Sydney awards@pacetoday.com.au

AS I write this, the manufacturing industry is reeling from Ford Motor Company’s announcement.

The closure of the Geelong and Broadmeadows manufacturing plants in 2016 is going to be painful for the communities involved. Many believe this is the beginning of the end for Australia’s car manufacturing industry.

Automotive manufacturing is among the most complex types of production bringing thousands of complex fabricated components, electronic and hydraulic systems, and comfort and convenience interior fittings together to make a single self propelled mobile unit.

It will be a huge loss

Exida Functional Safety Engineering Certification Training 17-21 June 2013, Perth training@heroengineering.com.au

Kevin Gomez Editor

The Science of Powder Handling and Processing 23-25 July 2013, Melbourne www.icheme.org/pt

Next Issue • Energy Management • Process Control in Oil & Gas • PACE Zenith Awards 2013: Winners Issue

For daily updates visit www.pacetoday.com.au

for the country to lose this expertise completely. Perhaps an option will be to retrain, re-skill and redeploy some of the engineering talent.Doesn’t our industry regularly complain about the skills shortage?

Perhaps it’s wishful thinking, but a clever government would reduce the current $400 million subsidies that prop up this industry and instead use the tax payers’ money to retrain our engineering workforce in the technologies of tomorrow which are built around innovation, agility and convergence.

On the bright side, we can look forward to the 2013 PACE Zenith Awards event on

Thursday June 13 in Sydney where we celebrate some of Australia’s best and brightest.

This tenth Awards event is certainly a milestone and we received 83 high quality nominations. Do come and join us, it is shaping up to be a fun night.

And with the The Chasers on MC duty, anything can happen. To purchase tickets, please contact Samantha Conway (samantha. conway@cirrusmedia.com.au/ 02 8484 0882). kevin.gomez@cirrusmedia.com.au

Like us on Facebook and join the conversation facebook.com/PACEtoday

TRENDS

ARC Advisory Group reveals top technologies for 2013 Convergence will help transform the way industrial enterprises operate and collaborate.

ARC Advisory Group analysts track a broad range of emerging technologies related to manufacturing, infrastructure, industrial automation and IT, and enterprise applications.

A special ARC report highlights selected technologies that they believe will have significant impact over the next several years, if not well into the future.

Clearly, many of the hottest technology trends today represent a convergence of largely internet- and

IT-based enabling technologies.

ARC believes that this convergence is likely to remove many existing constraints to help transform the way manufacturers and other industrial enterprises operate and collaborate, both internally and across their extended value chains, and do so to a degree that we have not witnessed in recent decades. • While far from a comprehensive list, ARC feels the following hot technologies provide a good “feelâ€? for

the overall landscape: • Intelligent devices and the Internet of Things • Predictive analytics for Big Data • Cloud computing and services-based solutions • Virtualisation • 3D simulation and augmented reality • Mobility-enabled applications and “wearableâ€? technologies • BYOD • Remote operations/ asset management

• Additive manufacturing/ 3D printing Registered ARC Advisory Group clients can download the complete report from the ARC website (http://bit.ly/10MZ8M4).

ARC Advisory Group’s coverage of technology trends extends from business systems to product and asset lifecycle management, supply chain management, operations management, energy optimisation and automation systems. www.arcweb.com

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06 www.pacetoday.com.au JUNE 2013

OPSMANAGE13

Engage:Envision:Empower

THE Invensys OpsManage 2013 conference was recently held in Fremantle, Western Australia. It’s the first time the event has left the eastern seaboard and perhaps reflects the company’s increasing presence in the mining, oil & gas sectors.

Invensys has been through some interesting times over the past few years but recent acquisitions and a major divestment may put the company on much stronger footing. In fact growth over the past 18 months has been solid.

The sale of Invensys Rail to Siemens, announced in November last year, netted GBP 1.8 billion ($2.8 billion). Some of this will go to towards resolving the company’s pension liabilities in the UK. “It’s very exciting times for us as a significant chunk of these funds is now available for R&D,” said Keith Marriner, Managing Director, Invensys Australia and New Zealand, in his opening address.

With cash in hand, Invensys will also be looking for smart investments acquisitions which include software, systems and instrumentation.

An example is Spiral Software which Invensys acquired last year. “This company has expertise in assessing the assay value of the crude which dials into the production processes and then optimises the refineries,” explained Marriner. “When you look at the Invensys portfolio it fits the whole supply chain within a refinery.”

Spiral Software provides an integrated refiningindustry solution designed from the ground up, bringing together feedstock data management, planning and scheduling and extends Invensys’ SimSci-Esscor solution.

DEMO ALLEY: The event this year featured plenty of integrated solutions.

OpsManage 2013 also showcased some interesting new releases from Invensys, notably Triconex Safety View.

It is said to be the world’s first software for effective alarm and bypass management certified by TÜV Rheinland to IEC61508 Systematic Capability 3 for use in applications up to Safety Integrity Level 3. Additionally, Triconex Trident and Triconex General Purpose safety instrumented systems now support OPC Unified Architecture for greater communications connectivity.

Says Barry Young, principal analyst for ARC Advisory Group, “By clearly indicating level-1 alarms to operators, maintenance engineers and shift supervisors, and then showing them all the safetycritical devices that have been placed in bypass, the Triconex Safety View solution reduces the likelihood of unscheduled downtime and subsequent loss of production.

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NEWS

Because it provides contextual information in real time, it helps operators and other plant personnel make better decisions.”

A common theme through the conference streams was strengthening cyber security. “This was news five years ago but it’s clearly an ongoing issue and we have to constantly lift our game and ensure this is addressed inherently in our products,” said Marriner.

The Demo Alley at OpsManage events typically showcases solutions from Invensys and its partners.

“Based on feedback from previous conferences, the event this year featured plenty of integrated solutions,” explained Marriner.

One of the presenters was Tim Sowell, VP of System Strategy and Invensys Fellow who covered sustainable safety excellence. “Our direction at the moment is around operational empowerment or operational excellence,” Sowell told PACE. “There are three main aspects

DIRECTION: Tim Sowell, VP of System Strategy and Invensys Fellow.

CONTROL: Brett Giroud (L) and Neil Tinley of Sinclair Knight Merz at Invensys OpsManage 2013. to operational excellence, one is operational empowerment – that’s people. The second is asset and production management and performance – safety goes into that.

Then the third is lifecycle.” [PACE

will feature an in-depth interview with Tim Sowell in a forthcoming issue.]

A Mine of the Future workshop garnered a lot of interest. This session was about applying simulation and knowledge management into mining

and oil & gas operations.

“OpsManage is not a sales pitch conference,” said Marriner. “It’s about users, potential users and integrators getting together, exchanging ideas, creating a network and checking to see what else can be of value to them in their operations.” iom.invensys.com

JUNE 2013 www.pacetoday.com.au 07

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OPINION

EFFICIENCY

Intelligent device management End users are not utilising the available device diagnostics, writes Paula Hollywood.

F

IELD instrumentation and analytical chemistry device suppliers have made tremendous progress over the last decade incorporating value-added functionality into intelligent devices. This includes enhanced visualisation and health monitoring functionality to facilitate predictive maintenance (PdM).

Despite these technological advancements, many manufacturers are not utilising digital device diagnostics to their best advantage.

Consequently, plant operational efficiency has not improved significantly nor have costs due to device-related accidents decreased.

To address this issue, the International Society on Automation (ISA) has recently formed a new standard committee, ISA108, to characterise intelligent device management in the process industries. The committee will define standard templates for best practices and work processes based on information derived from intelligent field devices, including models and terminology, implementation guidelines, and detailed work processes.

ARC defines PAM systems as hardware, software, and services that assess plant asset health by monitoring asset condition periodically or in real time to identify potential problems before these can affect the process or escalate to a catastrophic failure. Asset monitoring, one set of applications falling under the asset performance management umbrella, also includes enterprise asset management (EAM), mobility, reliability, ERP systems, and other sources of information.

These include energy management systems (EMS), environmental, health, and safety (EH&S) systems, and sustainability. APM systems provide a compelling case for reducing operational costs while simultaneously improving operational performance. APM leverages the power embedded in various operations and maintenance applications to improve asset availability.

However, to date, the emphasis has been on monitoring production assets.

ARC research indicates approximately 75 percent of monitoring investments target production assets. As illustrated above, most production assets contain

moving parts that are subject to wear and degradation. Vibration technology is used extensively to monitor these assets.

The evidence indicates that automation assets are taking a backseat when it comes to monitoring asset health. According to Ian Verhappen, co-chair of ISA108, “More than 80 percent of smart instrument data is not being used or even connected to an

More than 80 percent of smart instrument data is not being used or even connected to an online data collection system. online data collection system.� ARC believes that this is counter intuitive given that production asset monitoring frequently requires additional external equipment, while most automation assets already contain a high degree of embedded intelligence. While the level

of digital technology implemented in field devices is evolving operational enhancements will not be realised if organizations continue to underutilise the available functionality.

Given that intelligent devices and products are widely available, there is a consensus that end users are not utilising the available device diagnostics.

Traditional maintenance work processes often exacerbate this situation.

Poorly defined problems, for example, waste time and effort.

Maintenance for non-critical devices is frequently deferred. Scheduled inspections and testing that reveal nothing are necessary, but wasteful.

Formed in August 2012, the ISA108 committee is charged with defining standard templates of best practices and work processes for the design, development, installation and use of diagnostic and other information provided by intelligent field devices in the process industries.

[Paula Hollywood (phollywood@ arcweb.com) is Senior Analyst, ARC Advisory Group.] www.arcweb.com

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OPINION

IICA

Charting the IICA’s growth The IICA has grown from simple beginnings and a collection of disparate entites into the national body for instrumentation and automation, writes Cathie Tynan.

I

N THE early 1940s, Paul Crivelli, at that time General Manager of ABACUS Instrument, arranged a regular monthly luncheon with a number of Melbourne professionals involved in instrumentation.

Following a discussion with instrument company representatives on 20 July 1943, a public meeting was called for 24 August 1943 at which a motion for the formation of The Australian Society of Instrument Technology (ASIT) was passed. This is believed to be the first national technical society in the world to be formed specifically to deal with instrumentation.

At the meeting, members elected as President, Dr P L Henderson, the Chief Chemist of Monsanto (Australia), and as Vice President, Dr N B Lewis, the Chief Chemist of Kodak (Australasia). P A Crivelli was elected Honorary Secretary.

During 1944 several members travelled to Sydney and addressed a gathering of instrumentation professionals there; as a result, the Australian Institute of Instrument Technology (AIIT) was formed in Sydney. The two organizations subsequently agreed to produce the Australian Journal of Instrument Technology as the official organ of both bodies, management of the Journal being arranged by ASIT.

Expanding south In 1953 a South Australian Division of ASIT was formed. Negotiations between ASIT and AIIT took place and on 11 June 1957 the AIIT resolved to amalgamate with ASIT to form the Society of Instrument Technology Australia. In November 1957, The Society of Instrument Technology Australia was incorporated under the Victorian Companies Act. The two founder bodies continued

negotiations and on 25 March 1958, ASIT passed a motion authorising its Committee ‘to wind up the affairs of ASIT and transfer all its assets to the Victorian Division of the Society of Instrument Technology Australia (SITA) when it deems fit’. The two founder bodies ceased to exist on 1 January 1959 and R B Pearson of ICIANZ became the first President of the new amalgamated Society of Instrument Technology Australia.

It has taken many years of perseverance to allay fears and build trust in a federated system.

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On 10 November 1966, the name of the amalgamated body was officially changed to the Institute of Instrumentation and Control Australia.

And in October 2002 the Institute’s name was changed to the Institute of Instrumentation, Control and Automation Australia (IICA). The IICA has continued uninterrupted for the ensuing 47 years.

The Institute has been a constantly evolving organization, responding and adapting to new challenges and opportunities arising from changes to both the economic and political environments.

As the Institute grew in confidence in Victoria and New South Wales, it recognised the need to attract and form Divisions in the rest of Australia if it was to truly envisage becoming a national body. Considerable efforts by dedicated people such as J David Aspinall, David

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OPINION

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Paule and others led to the formation of Divisions in Queensland (originally in Mackay), Western Australia, South Australia and later of Branches in the Murray Region, Newcastle and Gladstone. The Institute had at last gone national.

Each geographic location elected its Chairman, Treasurer as well as Secretary who conducted the business of their Divisions and Branches via an overarching Committee plus a number of Sub Committees which managed the differing activities and initiatives that each area devised and carried out.

Each area chose representatives from its Committee to attend an annual Federal Council meeting where they worked to formulate policies and strategies that would meld the Institute into a cooperative national body. This was not always an easy task, as each Division had its own priorities and was keen to retain its autonomy.

Federated system It has taken many years of perseverance to allay such fears and to build up trust in a federated system.

Nevertheless, it has happened, and it has done so in an evolutionary fashion that has been, on the whole, mindful of the imperative to balance the needs of each geographic area with those of the national interest.

Initially every Division and Branch was manned by the Members, all of who were volunteers. However, over the years the Federal Council in particular, had become much more complex and onerous for volunteers to manage the administrative and logistic affairs of the IICA and it brought in the services of Don Wilcox, originally as Victorian Division Secretary, and later to become Federal Secretary to take charge of these matters.

This was the start of the journey to professionalism and led to decisions by Federal Council to outsource the administrative and financial functions, thereby freeing up members, especially on Federal Council, to concentrate their energies on leadership of the IICA. In 2009 Federal Council, under the leadership of Federal President Mario Dona decided that the IICA needed to take total control of its affairs. [Mario Dona was awarded the 2011 PACE Zenith Lifetime Achievement Award for his contribution to the industry.]

The institute needed paid staff to take on the administrative functions that had been previously outsourced and appointed Cathie Tynan in 2009 as Federal Secretary, to be followed the same year with Maruta Rodan as the Institute’s Executive Officer.

The Federal Office hired additional staff including Caroline French as Event Coordinator and Leigh Hart as Membership Officer. One of the current Federal President Brett Simpson’s plans has been to bring in paid administrative staff in every location, and it is pleasing to report that both the Brisbane and Adelaide Branches have just recently appointed their Branch Secretaries. Nancy Knott (Brisbane Branch) and Lisa Tomblin (Adelaide Branch) join Julie Meynell from the Sydney Branch in looking after their respective local Branch activities. Julie also manages the Institute’s email and hard copy newsletters.

Under Mario Dona’s Presidency, Federal Council resolved in 2009, to address the vexing issue of the need for a total overhaul of the Institute’s nearly 70 year old, Constitution as its Rules and By-Laws were simply no

longer ‘fit for purpose’. The work was completed in 2010. One noteworthy change was that each geographic location is now called a Branch, and is identified by the prefix of the city where that branch is located.

Another significant milestone is the re-establishment of the professional relationship with our American counterpart organization, the International Society of Automation (ISA). This relationship was reinvigorated under the Presidency of Craig Baade in 2006 and led to the IICA introducing professional training courses under licence from the ISA. These courses are available in each Branch and continue to this day.

In 2011, under Dirk Kuiper’s watch as President, the spotlight fell on two important Membership matters. One was the transformation of the existing Corporate Associate Member (CAP) category into the new Corporate Industry Programme (CIP). The success of the CIP Category has been very encouraging – since its first introduction in the 2013 calendar year, the uptake of companies under CIP has almost rivalled those for individual members. Jason Freyling and Frank Silberberg deserve special mention for initiating this change. Likewise, the Fellow membership category has

A significant milestone is the reestablishment of the professional relationship with our American counterpart organization the International Society of Automation.

undergone extensive revision to reflect more accurately the need for proper acknowledgement of those special IICA members whose contributions to the Institute and to our industry sectors are deemed outstanding. Mario Dona and Ian Gibson deserve acknowledgement for progressing this change.

A feature of the Institute that seems to have been set in stone and just continues to shine year in and year out are the Table Top Exhibitions or Technology Expos as they are now known. Around 15 are conducted in each Australian capital city as well as in many regional areas every year. These exhibitions provide invaluable access for IICA member supplier and service providers to meet and do business with potential end users.

Their introduction has truly been one of the IICA’s outstanding successes.

There are many more areas that have not been canvassed in this short tribute to the Institute on its 70th birthday year. This is inevitable because space simply does not permit all achievements and those who initiated and progressed them to be mentioned. Suffice to say that the Institute today stands on the shoulders of all those dedicated men and women whose vision, energy, enthusiasm and foresight has made the IICA into a vibrant professional Institute that is very much looking forward to the next 70 years.

[Cathie Tynan is IICA Federal Secretary.] admin@iica.org.au www.iica.org.au

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BEHIND THE SCENES

A clear view on water production The Greater Wellington Regional Council was drowning in data from its SCADA system that runs four automated water treatment plants and 15 pumping stations so they developed a production intelligence solution that empowers stakeholders with information they need.

I

N 2008, the New Zealand Ministry of Health issued revised drinking-water standards for drinking-water safety. To comply, water treatment facilities must track, save and provide monthly reports on water production, intake and discharge levels. At the same time, water providers need timely usage reports to make sure municipal customers can properly budget and forecast for city water needs.

As one of the largest water producers in New Zealand, the Greater Wellington Regional Council

INFORMATION: The GWRC accesses consumption reports using a FactoryTalk VantagePoint EMI portal via a web browser allowing all verified stakeholders to gain insight into production without creating version control issues.

(GWRC) is responsible for supplying clean water to more than 10 percent of New Zealandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s population. Drawing water from lakes, rivers, wells and aquifers, the council is the wholesale water treatment provider for the cities of Lower Hutt, Porirua, Upper Hutt and Wellington.

In order to comply with the changing regulations, the GWRC required a reporting solution which can provide accurate and timely reports generated from data automatically retrieved from its existing water treatment production and control-

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BEHIND THE SCENES

system infrastructure. As a result, the GWRC was not only able to comply with government reporting requirements, but it was also able to leverage real-time production data to improve water treatment distribution, and better inform internal and external stakeholders on water production and usage.

Reliable archive The GWRC employs the most advanced water treatment system in New Zealand with a SCADA system that runs four entirely automated water treatment plants, 15 pumping stations and more than 180 kilometers of pipeline. This system provides highquality water for the southern portion of North Island.

However, collecting process data from disparate data sources proved challenging, especially since data needed to be stored in a reliable timeseries archive for analysis and reports.

Lily Wang, data analyst for GWRC, explained that it was time consuming to manually extract and organize data from different sources within the water treatment system for required governmental compliance reports.

14 www.pacetoday.com.au JUNE 2013

STATUS: The GWRC can now provide regional water-supply data to the public via their website including information on the total daily supply available for each city.

A faster, more accurate and automated reporting system was needed; one that could generate predetermined reports automatically and share them with authorized groups. This system also needed data validation capability as well as the ability to retain 10 years of data.

Visibility of data GWRC implemented FactoryTalk Historian Site Edition (SE) and FactoryTalk VantagePoint Enterprise Manufacturing Intelligence (EMI) software onto GWRC servers. The historian provided ready connectivity to GWRC plantsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; automation-system

controllers, with the capability to automatically pull tags directly from different controllers via interface nodes. Tags are then stored in the FactoryTalk Historian server for the required 10 year retention period.

Once stored this information is available to be retrieved for trending comparisons and other analysing and reporting purposes.

Using FactoryTalk VantagePoint EMI software, the GWRCâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s datamanagement system is able to schedule and produce 11 automatically generated reports to provide information on weekly and daily water consumption, discharge, intake, water quality and reservoir levels, as well as reports on lake storage volumes and total-flow volume.

Analysts like Wang, water production/maintenance engineers and operators, business managers, marketing, and GWRC committee members charged with water-supply management and regional strategy have access to this data from any location Secure login via a web-browser brings each stakeholder to a single portal where they can access predetermined dashboards and charts.

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Forge ahead with us on your team Talk to us about your product requirements. Our fully integrated plant has a CAD department, forging equipment, CNC machine shop and heat treatment facility which, along with our NATA endorsed laboratory, gives you the quality and consistency you need to give you that competitive edge. And we deliver the technical capability and short lead times you want. Our mill liner and structural bolts for mill manufacturers are well known to the mining world but weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re especially keen to make new products for different industries.

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BEHIND THE SCENES

Facility operators have visibility of real-time consumption data for validation that usage levels are as expected. If demand peaks, more water can be supplied from other plants.

Business managers are able to make comparisons on year-to-date usage versus the previous year, to ensure billing forecasts based on past usages are accurate, or to update expected revenues.

“The FactoryTalk software suite’s high level of integration and multicompatible connectivity to existing hardware and software components in our plants and business system has given us the ability to pull reliable data from the widest variety of sources,” Wang said.

“Combined with the processing power in FactoryTalk VantagePoint software and its accessible dashboards, trends, X-Y plots, and Microsoft Excel reports, we are able to transform all this rich data into information people can actually use for a diverse set of purposes.”

Empowering stakeholders

CURRENT: The GWRC now offers a live map of the current rate of water supply (the map is updated every 15 minutes).

With immediate access to system-wide production metrics a wider team is able to respond to errors or failure like pipeline leaks before they create major issues.

The GWRC had a need for a reliable and effective data-management solution.

Working with Rockwell Automation, they developed a production intelligence strategy that empowers stakeholders with information they need to help make informed decisions.

Data is now more quickly available and accurate. “Reports that used to take me the better part of a week to create and several more days to validate can now be produced in a few minutes or even seconds,” claims Wang.

This level of insight allows operations managers and business leaders to incorporate production metrics into business plans and to give feedback to system technicians based on hard data to more quickly resolve issues or improve operations.

As a data analyst, Wang checks water intake and production data every day. “With real-time data immediately available, it’s as easy as doing a balance check.” In the summer of 2012, during one daily validation, more water was taken in than what was fed into the drinking-water system, signifying a leak.

Wang was able to immediately contact the maintenance engineers responsible for the appropriate plant and direct them to the relevant pipeline to find and fix the leak. The problem was discovered and solved before the leak was noticeable to production engineers or developed into a larger issue. Wang added, “Our data system is so reliable now, that we’ve made it public.”

The GWRC now offers a live map (www.gw.govt.nz/live-water-supply/) of the current rate of water supply, which is updated every 15 minutes. As residents are now able to see water use by city over a monthly, quarterly and annual basis, the GWRC hopes a public that is more informed about water production and usage will better conserve water, especially in times of peak demand.

The GWRC has rolled out this same scalable solution to track systemwide chemical and power usage. “We have a firm grasp on our chemical and power inputs,” explains Wang, “we can optimise the control system to get the best information to our business managers, so they get the best value from our budget.”

Rockwell Automation 03 9757 1111 www.rockwellautomation.com.au

16 www.pacetoday.com.au JUNE 2013

PA0613_017.pdf

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PACE ZENITH AWARDS 2013 3 FINALISTS S

Water & Wastewater FINALISTS

APC Integration

Sinclair Knight Merz

Common pump station design delivers benefits to six Councils in South Australia Following identification of the need to improve maintenance standards and ensure regulatory compliance of community wastewater management systems, a group of six local councils in the South East of the State agreed to conduct a pilot study to assess the benefit of an across-Council’s joint service arrangement. There existed different switchgear and ways of operation between the various council wastewater systems and there was an obvious need to improve compliance and upgrade emergency communications systems.

APC Integration, was commissioned to create a common design and standard for all community wastewater management systems across the respective council regions. Common hardware would result in bulk purchasing discounts, reduced spares, simplified maintenance and reduced training for staff. A unique aspect of this project was designing a system that could be used by six different councils with shared resources while controlling how much of the data can be shared between councils. This was a tricky political situation, and the solution was to avoid storing data at any of the council depots and instead use a ‘cloud’ based design. Once fully implemented, this pilot project is likely to provide a strong impetus for promotion of the model to other regions across the state, as well as potentially to other regions across Australia.

Critical Portfolio Work Program Goodna STP Upgrade Stage 4A Promoting a healthy ecosystem that will sustainably support the livelihoods and lifestyles of people in the region was a collaborative vision developed by Queensland Urban Utilities (QUU) and the South East Queensland Healthy Waterways Strategy. The achievement of this vision to rehabilitate and protect the Brisbane River catchment was progressed by the upgrade of Goodna Sewage Treatment Plant (STP). QUU identified that the Goodna STP required a significant upgrade to meet not only the identified future demand for wastewater services of the region, but also to meet stringent effluent release license limits which will come into effect in 2013.

Sinclair Knight Merz (SKM) was engaged to provide multi-disciplinary engineering design services, including process, mechanical, civil, electrical, instrumentation and control for this upgrade of the Goodna STP. Key outcomes included: An increase in treatment capacity of 89%, from 50,000 EP to 90,000 EP; Significantly improved environmental outcomes by reduced nutrient loads on the Brisbane River, achieved through stringent effluent design limits and the use of a disinfection process that does not create environmentally harmful by-products, whilst improving biosolids stabilisation and dewatering. The implementation of a real time monitoring and control system as part of the Goodna STP upgrade was a critical element in the achievement of promoting a healthy ecosystem that will sustainably support the livelihoods and lifestyles of people in the region.

SA Water North-South Interconnection System Project SA Water’s North South Interconnection System Project (NSISP) consists of a range of works to connect up the northern and southern water supply networks.

The project has delivered four new pipelines, three pump stations, three valve stations as well as a number of smaller works across the water distribution network to allow SA Water to move water across one connected system. The project improves water reliability for metropolitan Adelaide and allows water from the new Adelaide desalination plant to be distributed throughout the whole water supply network system. The project is a $403 million infrastructure investment and has been delivered to improve network security and flexibility for Adelaide.

The NSISP has been delivered by SA Water utilising private sector expertise through an integrated project delivery model. This differs from the more standard design and construct or early contractor involvement contract models that are usually employed by the business to deliver major capital projects. This has enabled a flexibility of approach to deliver against a range of challenges including compressed timeframes, community concern, technical risk, asset condition, water quality, customer service, procurement process and brand management. SA Water and its partners achieved design, deliver, install and commission within the tight timeframes necessary for the project. Extensive design work allowed the removal of an intermediate transformer on the input controlling a 3,300 volt motor thereby saving an anticipated 1 to 2% losses over 6MW of installed motor load.

UGL Engineering The Nepean Water Filtration Plant - Electrical and SCADA Upgrade One of Sydney Water’s critical water supply systems is the Nepean Water Filtration Plant (WFP), located in the Southern Highlands of NSW, supplying residents with 36 million Litres of water a day. To improve the reliability of the plant, a new site wide PLC and SCADA system was implemented, and associated mechanical and electrical equipment were upgraded, ensuring the plant continues to produce high quality water for the community. UGL was engaged by Sydney Water to design, construct and commission the Nepean WFP Renewal of SCADA and Electrical Assets Project.

Sound approaches to quality and project management ensured project success within schedule and budget. Technological innovations such as new designs of positioning valve actuators, and the design of a robust duty/ standby Profibus communication network will safeguard the plant’s reliability for many years to come. Carefully considered approaches to cut-overs, commissioning and plant optimisation ensured no unplanned disruptions to the plant’s production during the life cycle of the project, and enables operators to further fine tune plant parameters well into the future.

[Editor’s Note: These are the nominations received at the time of going to press.

Once judging is complete, Finalists will be announced on www.pacetoday.com.au.

They will also be individually notified.]

JUNE 2013 www.pacetoday.com.au 17

PA0613_000_EME

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1

2013-05-23T11:01:09+10:00

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rosemount.com//someweblink The Emerson logo is a trademark and a service mark of Emerson Electric Co. © 2012 Emerson Electric Co.

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PACE ZENITH AWARDS 2013 FINALISTS

Lifetime Achievement FINALISTS

Ian Gibson Ian Gibson joined the IICA’s precursor, the SITA, in 1960 and soon after was invited to join the Victorian Branch committee as Chairman; he became Hon. Federal Secretary and then a member of the Federal executive committee, a post which he held for many decades.

He has held the post of President of the Institute, and continues to serve on federal subcommittees, as well as serving as a member and officer of the Melbourne Branch committee for the past 48 years.

He represented the Institute as the Australian Delegate to the International Measurement Confederation (IMEKO) and continues to represent IICA on several Standards Australia committees and the RMIT Electrotechnology Consultative committee.

A voluntary organisation needs on ongoing corporate memory. With 53 years of membership and service to the IICA, Ian provides that continuity. If the organisation needs a job done, he will do it. Ian regularly contributes to the IICA by supporting Branch activities, being involved in organizational sub committees, acting as IICA representative on a number of Standards Committees and being able to assist the Secretariat with any number of subjects due to his extensive knowledge of the Institute and the Industry as a whole.

At 77, Ian remains in effectively full time employment as a Principal Engineer with WorleyParsons, having ’retired’ eight years ago from 33 years with Fluor Australia, as a ‘Fluor Fellow’.

He is an active member of a variety of ISO, IEC, AS and ISA standards committees on safety and measurement techniques and the author of several chapters in Liptak’s Instrument Engineers Handbook. He is chair of the AS committee for IEC 61511 Ed2, and serves on the corresponding IEC editorial committee. He is also serving on the ISO committee for 5167 Part 5 (Cone meters), and on the ISA S84 committee.

He provides mentoring services within WorleyParsons and on a variety of engineering websites. He also consults and provides lecturing and HAZOP leader services outside WorleyParsons. He is an Hon. Life Member of RACI (CChem, CPChem), Life Senior Member of ISA, Fellow of IICA, and Associate Fellow of IChemE. He is a RPEQ (Chemical) and TUV FSEng (1/04).

[Editor’s Note: These are the nominations received at the time of going to press.

Once judging is complete, Finalists will be announced on www.pacetoday.com.au.

They will also be individually notified.]

Russell Hughes Russell is the Engineering Director and co-founder of Integra Systems. With 35 years of engineering, innovative product development and senior management experience, Russell joined his son Paul Hughes at Integra Tooling Systems (now Integra Systems) in 1993 as Joint Director to develop his dream of harnessing innovation to develop engineering solutions for Australian industry.

His inventive predisposition led him conceive the world’s first high speed Coil Processing Line (Punch-IT Coil Processing), which together with Paul Hughes, was ultimately built as Integra’s first production machine. At Integra, Russell works closely with customers to support product development and engineering solutions that are cost effective to produce, and assist with positioning them well in the Australian market.

Russell’s hands-on and mentoring approach at Integra Systems allows him to oversee engineering design, prototyping, all manufacturing functions and supply chain management. His philosophy is to think beyond the expected to deliver excellence in innovation and service. Throughout his engineering and manufacturing career, Russell identified a niche in the Australian market for a linear high speed coil processing line that would rival the steel punching competition by punching steel components at a rate that would ensure components less that 300 mm wide were produced economically.

Between 1993 and 1998, Integra Systems designed and built these machines for a range of customers, and branded it Punch-IT Coil Processing Line. This is a five-axis system consisting of an electronic feed system and a series of four punching stations suitable for most linear punching applications. Punching at a rate of 120 strokes per minute, coil is consumed and converted to finished parts at a rate of 20 linear metres per minute – at least six times faster than a turret punch press.

The Punch-IT line was so technologically advanced that the University of Melbourne’s Engineering Professor, Colin Burvill presented a paper on the machine at the International Conference of Engineering Design (ICED). In 1999, a strategic decision was made by Integra Systems to build an in-house Punch-IT line for component manufacture, and became the first production machine and manufacturing foundation.

Russell has also mentored his son Paul Hughes throughout his engineering and business management career, and supported Paul’s passion for innovation to ensure this continues to be the key differentiator of Integra’s entire business. This business has become a sustainable family-owned business that continues to harness Russell’s inventive predisposition as a cornerstone of its operations, value system and philosophy. At 72 years of age, Russell continues to strive for excellence in innovation for Integra and its customers and is not showing any signs of slowing down.

Russell began his engineering career in 1957 as an apprentice at the Maribyrnong Ordnance Factory. From here, he moved to Caterpillar’s Tractor Factory where engineering design became his specialty. He later became an engineering and design contractor for companies such as Ericsson, International Harvester, Ford, Zenford and General Motors Holden. Russell gained a vast range of skills and experience and became the Senior Engineer for Sidchrome. Russell took on the General Manager role with Rymer Lighting, a Division of Howard Smith Industries, which then became Thorn EMI. During Russell’s 17 year tenure at Rymer Lighting, he was promoted to Managing Director, and Manufacturing & Engineering Director of Howard Smith Industries and grew Rymer Lighting’s annual turnover from a $1 million to $33 million.

Russell’s contribution to engineering design and development is highly regarded by the University of Melbourne and he is a member of the University of Melbourne Engineering Design Group.

JUNE 2013 www.pacetoday.com.au 19

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PAC ZENITH AWARDS 2013 PACE FINALISTS FIN

Transport, Power & Infrastructure FINALISTS

Enerpac

Braendler Engineering

Navy’s largest ships hoisted and positioned accurately An Enerpac SyncHoist system has been successfully deployed by heavy lift and transport specialists Universal Cranes to ensure optimum accuracy and safety in the hoisting and positioning of key components of one of the largest ships ever built for the Royal Australian Navy. The Enerpac System was deployed by Universal Cranes for the Landing Helicopter Deck (LHD) vessel project under way at Williamstown, Victoria. Universal Cranes integrated the system with a 600 tonne crawler crane as part of the project management and engineering for the consolidation of steel blocks of between 164 to 300 tonnes on the deck of the first of the vessels being built by BAE Systems Australia. The four steel blocks, with variable centres of gravity, will become the operating control towers on the flight deck of the Canberra class LHD, one of two 28,000 tonne LHD vessels that will come into service in 2014 (HMAS Canberra) and 2015 (HMAS Adelaide) respectively. The SyncHoist allowed a gradual lift of the load, and dynamic adjustment in relation to the centre of gravity during the lift. This unique system allowed constant monitoring of load and stroke on each cylinder; ensuring very accurate control by the operator.

Aether Asset Inspection Service The Aether Inspection Service has been developed to provide a safe and reliable method for inspecting the surfaces of large scale infrastructure assets such as cooling towers, chimneys and blades of wind turbines. These infrastructure assets must be routinely inspected to reduce unscheduled maintenance. The Service was launched in Australia in 2012 and will be available in Europe the second half of this year. Traditionally, there is no easy way of capturing a high quality visual record of the surface of these assets. The standard approach is to employ rope, crane or scaffold based teams to scale the asset and photograph potential defects.

The resulting pictures from these inspections are usually incomplete and reliant on the human eye and the conditions on the day. In addition, this practice is risky and teams can only operate effectively in benign weather conditions. The Aether service comprises an engineered Image Capture Platform and supporting software management tools for image processing and analysis. Both the Imaging Platform and the software interface have been developed in-house by Braendler’s team of electrical, mechanical and software engineers and drawing on their experience in developing vision inspection and reporting systems for use in high speed manufacturing environments.

ICON Technologies Curtin University GEEP Laboratory Data Management System ICON Technologies engineered a data acquisition and distribution system for the GEEP Laboratory at the Curtin University Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. The laboratory is a multi-use facility for graduate, postgraduate and industry researchers, together with undergraduate students and teaching staff. It is used for the research of different renewable energy sources with a commercial scale power management and micro-grid infrastructure.

The operational and technical functions of the facility is managed by the GEEP Laboratory Data Management System. The system needed to provide unrestricted 24/7 access to all real-time and historical data for researchers, and limited but flexible access to real-time and historical data for students. Any researcher sitting at any workstation needed to be access real-time and historical data from any combination of renewable energy sources.

The system also needed to provide multiple levels of remote access so that staff could have full operational access to the system from a remote location, while various subsets of data could be made available over the Internet to various industry groups.

The solution comprised of a Windows 7 server PC, client PCs as required, three NI CompactRIO PAC Controllers to acquire point and waveform current/voltage data at selected system points, and to handle ancillary IO as required; and a MOXA serial interface to integrate the site weather station.

The custom system application software was developed in LabVIEW 2011. When completed, the GEEP Laboratory Data Management System was capable of handling mixed static and waveform signals at acquisition rates from 1 sample/s to 5,000 samples/s, together with serial and network data, in a single seamless system.

SolarOne Marketing FrontLiner The project was created from requests from a number of mining companies that had become aware of the SolarOne pathway products, hoping that the core technology may be adapted to meet their haulage road collision avoidance needs.

The aim was to create a sustainably powered, roadside device that could be used in mines in such a manner that an array, placed along side the haulage roads, could provide a delineated driving area as well as warn of hazards, corners, dips.

The lights had to be visible from the cabin of a large haulage truck, much the same as landing lights on an airfield would be visible to a pilot. They had to be able to be seen from a distance of at least 500 meters. They must be 100% reliable and turn on at dusk and off at dawn. There should be no requirement to service them for many months, preferably years. They must quickly absorb sunlight and store it, in such a manner that electricity would always be available to provide the guidance required.

A final field trial was then conducted that was run for six months after which it was determined that the product met the design specification.

[Editor’s Note: These are the nominations received at the time of going to press.

Once judging is complete, Finalists will be announced on www.pacetoday.com.au.

They will also be individually notified.]

20 www.pacetoday.com.au JUNE 2013

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PACE ZENITH AWARDS ARDS 2013 FINALISTS

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HJ Heinz Golden Circle Healthy Life As the first non-dairy probiotic beverage in Australia, the idea behind Golden Circle Healthy Life originated from research that identified immunity as the number one benefit sought by juice-consuming grocery buyers. As the first non-dairy probiotic beverage in Australia the technical challenges for the manufacturing team were significant covering supply chain, quality and manufacturing.

The application of the probiotic into a chilled juice product, in a factory that normally produces fresh juice, on a daily basis, required a dedicated cross functional team working closely together over a two year period. The Technical team were they required to carry out an extensive validation program, which had never been done in juice in Australia prior to this.

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Coopers Brewery Coopers Brewery upgrades its quality analysis system Recently, worldwide demand for Coopers products dictated that the company replace its custom-developed quality system with a modern system that not only would store quality data for years but also give Coopersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; personnel the ability to analyse the data and make continuous improvements. Technology partner Siemens provided the solution with its SIMATIC IT Unilab Laboratory Information Management System. One of the drivers behind an increase in the implementation of MES and MES functionality is the involvement of senior management wanting to link manufacturing processes to corporate strategies. These include the need to converge the top floor visions and shop floor system and drive overall value through governance, quality and cost management. The decision to use Unilab was based on its ability to integrate with the MES that Coopers was planning to implement.

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Sunshine Sugar Centrifugal drive system saves energy at Sunshine Sugar mill â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;AC or DC?â&#x20AC;&#x2122; That was the question facing Sunshine Sugar when they decided to replace their ageing centrifugal drive system. After considering all options, Sunshine Sugar chose an AC drive-motor combination. Replacing their 298KW DC centrifugal drive system for a 184KW AC motor-drive combination was a decision that required some convincing. Siemens provided analysis on their success with reducing the size of motors and drives by controlling the switching rate of the IGBT. The Active Front End technology allows users to reduce the size of the motor and drive without losing power, achieve harmonics of less than 1 percent and consequently reduce energy costs. AC drives are now preferred for centrifugals.

[Editorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Note: These are the nominations received at the time of going to press. Once judging is complete, Finalists will be announced on www.pacetoday.com.au. They will also be individually notified.]

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JUNE 2013 www.pacetoday.com.au 21

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Wireless intrusion prevention Attackers are zeroing in on the millions of wireless devices exploiting them to gain entry to networks and sensitive information.

E

NTERPRISES are expanding their wireless networks with increasing confidence, believing that rooting out rogue access points (APs) and implementing WPA2 will put an end to Wi-Fi security concerns. But attackers are zeroing in on the millions of corporate client devices, exploiting them to gain entry to corporate networks and sensitive information.

The opportunity for exploiting clients underscores the need for wireless intrusion prevention systems (WIPS) that can leverage the power of stateful traffic analysis to effectively deal with these and other security threats.

Wireless local areas networks (WLANs) are not nearly as secure as organisations might think. Even with all the attention focused on security at the AP, in the form of stronger authentication and encryption, many enterprises ignore wireless network traffic. This has left over-the-air connections a prime target into the network and network end users.

While organisations focus security efforts on locking down and monitoring corporate APs, attackers are now directly targeting client devices, which are the organisationsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; ubiquitous and most vulnerable assets.

Organisations must start thinking in terms of the same kind of end-to-end strategy that has characterised wired security since the deployment of firewalls, antivirus and intrusion detection systems.

Using new wireless client attack tools and techniques, outsiders can gather login and password data, or send traffic directly to an end-user, without ever touching the approved enterprise wired network. Equally important, new trends in wireless functionality open up tunnels into the network, which appear completely authentic.

Unfortunately, wired security systems do little to protect against this over-the-air malicious traffic.

Airborne traffic requires the same level of continuous monitoring and analysis 22 www.pacetoday.com.au JUNE 2013

MODES: The figure above shows the ad-hoc mode while the image below shows the infrastructure mode.

SECURITY: Virtualisation opens up Wi-Fi.

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as wire-bound traffic so organisation can detect activities that may expose corporate data.

Client devices Attackers are turning their attention to client devices, exploiting them from parking lots, airports and other hotspots.

Rogue AP detection is trivial compared to managing client-side wireless exposures and the client threat has become far more dangerous. Rogue APs are easy to find because there are few of them, and APs are relatively static.

Newer WLAN systems can automatically scan for unauthorised wireless APs. Security and network managers are attuned to the threats and generally proactive about seeking them out.

On the other hand, client vulnerabilities and exploits are much harder to detect. They are also more threatening because they require stateful monitoring and analysis of network traffic in the air.

Owning wireless clients Attackersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; ability to gain access to wireless clients is largely a product of the way these wireless connections work. Wireless technology is designed to facilitate fast, easy connectivity in a variety of settings, to a broad range of trusted and untrusted APs. Further, virtualisation lets devices simultaneously operate as legitimate clients and open APs, creating an unmanaged bridge to the outside world.

Client connections To understand these vulnerabilities, itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s important to recognise that there are multiple methods for connecting clients in a wireless network. Some of these approaches will inadvertently open up security holes.

The two most basic approaches are: â&#x20AC;˘ ad-hoc mode â&#x20AC;&#x201C; where clients connect directly user-to-user over the air â&#x20AC;˘ infrastructure mode â&#x20AC;&#x201C; where users connect to the wireless network through an intermediate device. This intermediary is designed to not only provide a connection, but also to ensure the security of that connection and protection of the network and associated clients.

While APs are typically purposebuilt devices (base stations, routers, etc.), they can just as easily be a â&#x20AC;&#x153;soft APâ&#x20AC;? â&#x20AC;&#x201C; software run on a traditional

end-user device, such as a laptop, that lets the Wi-Fi adapter behave as an AP to serve multiple clients.

An important distinction is that this soft AP is an either/or setting. The Wi-Fi adapter itself can act as either a client or an AP, but not both. This makes it relatively straightforward to judge what mode (or state) the adapter is in and monitor, manage and secure it appropriately.

The trend towards virtualisation eliminates this certainty about the state (client vs. AP) of any given wireless device. This can open up both individual client devices, and the

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Essentially, virtualisation creates vulnerability at the device level by turning a secure client connection into an unmanaged bridge into the network. Unknown connections, such as hackers and unauthorised users can access the network through a secure tunnel. The only way to monitor, assess and block the connection is through stateful analysis. This involves recognising that the device is in multiple client/AP states in the air.

Client-side attacks As wireless becomes a more pervasive and integral part of the extended corporate network organisations need to adopt security policies, procedures and technologies that can meet the challenges of this dynamic environment.

Rogue AP detection is simply not enough as it assumes you can â&#x20AC;&#x153;seeâ&#x20AC;? the unauthorised device. The vast majority of new Wi-Fi threats occur in the air, and focus on spoofing or hijacking or tunnelling through

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Âť JUNE 2013 www.pacetoday.com.au 23

PA0613_024.pdf

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IN FOCUS

Stateful inspection

authorised client devices.

These client devices are everywhere in the enterprise and the volume is growing every day. Add in the trend towards virtualisation, where potential holes are being baked right into chips, adapters and operating systems, and client-side security quickly becomes a losing game.

It requires organisations to know about, and control, every single device.

Network traffic The only way to effectively avoid this trap is to adopt the same approach used in the wired world: look at the network traffic itself.

Just as in the wired world, detecting anomalous and illicit wireless traffic, including attempts against client devices, devices holding multiple states or compromised or spoofed devices, requires stateful, continuous traffic monitoring and analysis.

But existing wired traffic monitoring wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t cut it. By the time the hacker has access to the network, the connection looks legitimate.

SOFT AP: Software run on a traditional end-user device lets the Wi-Fi adapter behave as an AP to serve multiple clients.

The only way to monitor wireless traffic efficiently in an enterprise environment is to deploy WIPS technology, which is unique among wireless security tools because of its ability to look at all traffic in the air statefully.

Constant monitoring and analysis lets WIPS accurately detect all types of attack tools.

This includes, wireless traffic intended for corporate clients, such as DoS attacks designed to separate clients from the corporate network and connect to the attacker.

WIPS can also monitor and analyse attack scenarios where the client is first separated from the corporate network and then reassociates with the spoofed networks.

Wi-Fi is a dominant and increasingly pervasive means of communicating in the office, in the home and on the road. Client devices go everywhere, connecting in all types of environments. Because of their dynamic nature they are vulnerable, even when deployed with the strongest available security standards.

Organisations must recognise that Wi-Fi increasingly acts as a connection point, or bridge, between the trusted inside network, users and data and the outside world. This bridge is literally in the air around us.

Just as with wired networks, wireless security requires stateful inspection and traffic analysis. As organisations rely more on wireless communications to service employees, partners and customers they must adopt dedicated WIPS technology to keep up with the mounting threats across the airwaves.

Fluke Networks www.flukenetworks.com

Ă&#x203A; -NLM XUJJI IFYF QTLLNSL KWTR -_ YT P-_ UJW HMFSSJQ Ă&#x203A; -TXY QJ[JQ HTSYWTQQJW QJ[JQ RJFXZWJRJSY FSI . 4 QJ[JQ HTRUTSJSYX Ă&#x203A; Ă&#x2013;-TY 8\FUUFGQJĂ&#x2014; RTIZQFW XYWZHYZWJ KTW JKKNHNJSY XHFQFGNQNY^ FSI XJW[NHJFGNQNY^ Ă&#x203A; 2N] Ă&#x201D;SĂ&#x201D; RFYHM MTZXNSLX ).3 7FNQ Ă&#x2014; 7FHP 5TWYFGQJ Ă&#x203A; 8JWNFQ NSYJWKFHJ *YMJWSJY 9(5 .5 TW :)5 TW F SZRGJW TK NSIZXYWNFQ KNJQIGZX X^XYJRX NSHQZINSL *YMJW(&9 FSI 5WTKNGZX )5

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\\\ UFHIFYFX^X HTR FZ .SYJQQNLJSY 8TQZYNTSX KTW 2JFXZWJRJSY FSI 9JXY &ZYTRFYNTS 24 www.pacetoday.com.au JUNE 2013

PA0613_025.pdf

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BEHIND THE SCENES

Communication is key Reliable communications between PLCs and HMIs, intuitive operation and easy maintainability are imperative in remote mining operations, writes Sarah Falson.

A

KARA Mining Limited is the Thai subsidiary of Kingsgate Consolidated Limited. The company owns and operates the Chatree Gold Mine in central Thailand. The Chatree site had already been running for 11 years using Wonderware’s InTouch SCADA system but, due to expansion plans, a revision of these SCADA assets and their operation was on the mine’s agenda.

Akara Mining chose engineering company Ausenco for the implementation of the expanded system. According to Ausenco senior electrical/ lead control systems engineer

FIGURE 1: The operator has improved control over the mine’s critical processes.

Martyn Hilbers, one of the reasons Akara decided to expand its process plant was due to rising gold prices.

“Since 2008 the world has been experiencing a financial turn down.

Investors have been reverting back to the traditional safer commodities such as precious metals, and as result the gold price has gone up,” he told PACE. Ausenco partnered with Wonderware Australia as a consultant on the Akara Mining project.

“The effective corporation between Wonderware and Ausenco raised the level of quality of the design and was a great contribution to the success of

»

JUNE 2013 www.pacetoday.com.au 25

PA0613_026.pdf

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BEHIND THE SCENES

the project,” said Hilbers.

The main emphasis for the project was on the communication failover strategy, intuitive operation and easy maintainability. It was crucial that the upgraded system would be maintainable by local personnel.

“Most of the mine sites are in remote locations and it takes more than 24 hours to travel to the site. The main reason is that when there is a problem resulting in down time, it literally costs gold when the plant stops,” said Hilbers. “It is therefore very important that people working at the mine site are capable of maintaining, trouble shooting and making changes to the system.”

Graphics standard According to Akara Mining maintenance and project manager, Wayne Cole, another important request was the implementation of Wonderware’s ArchestrA HMI system, which needed to comply with the existing InTouch HMI graphic’s standard, but at the

26 www.pacetoday.com.au JUNE 2013

GROWTH: Failover scripting versatility allows for future expansion of the system.

same time use current industry practices and technologies.

“This expansion, revision and updating of our SCADA facilities has given us improved production effectiveness through reliable communications and provision for expansion without the need for repeated and costly engineering efforts in the future,” Cole said.

The project took approximately five months in 2011 during which the old

and new systems were linked to one another and ran in parallel.

Historical information The seven InTouch stations are connected to a GE Fanuc-based PLC network via a redundant GigaBit ring topology network, and monitor approximately 2000 I/Os. All InTouch stations have access to historical information from the Wonderware Historian for analysis and

Batch sequences are designed by a process engineer and are conveyed to the control system engineer in a process control philosophy document.

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BEHIND THE SCENES

reference purposes.

“ArchestrA’s ease of scripting made our job easier and we were able to provide Chatree Mine with more useful functionality in a shorter time than would otherwise be possible,” said Ausenco’s Hilbers.

Though the project has been completed, the control system has been designed specifically with provisions for future expansion. The control system network backbone design offers the possibility to break the network and insert additional network nodes/cables without taking the system ‘down’.

Also, the additional communication load capacity allows for a large number of additional PLCs and HMI stations.

Failover script Because the legacy system ran on a single communication channel network, Chatree Mining was experiencing some latency as the inter-PLC data exchange and HMI values were not updated rapidly enough. The solution was a redundant GigaBit Ethernet network with redundant I/O servers.

Since the operating rooms are spread out over the site, there are four I/O servers providing communication channels between the PLCs and the HMI stations.

The servers are connected via a dual Ethernet channel to the PLCs, allowing the HMI to connect to each PLC in four ways: Lan A via Server 1; Lan B via Server 1; Lan A via Server 2; and Lan B via Server 2.

This means there are four ‘access names’ or Wonderware communication channels that have to be monitored for the failover mechanism.

“Wonderware has an innate failover functionality, Enable Secondary Source, however this allows failover between two ‘access names’ where we had four on this project, so this was the challenge,” said Hilbers.

“Whenever an access name is active it requires system resources and network bandwidth, so the second challenge was to reduce the amount of access names and the data exchange on these access names. I solved this by actually adding a fifth dynamic access name and making the other four static.”

According to Hilbers, the script itself is very short and simple. Every time the failover script activates and changes the access name, or when a heartbeat on one of the communication channels is

INTOUCH: Improved network infrastructure and production monitoring.

not detected, the operator is notified by an alarm.

Navigation Another important feature built into the system is the navigation tabs: “If you read the tabs from the left to the right you will notice that it follows the process flow shown on the overview page [Figure 1].

The overview page allows the operator to make a quick assessment of the health of the plant. If there is a fault or an alarm active, the outline (dotted rectangle) of the area with the fault/ active alarm, will blink orange on the overview page,” explained Hilbers.

“The operator can click on the orange blinking area on the overview page or on the tab to navigate to the process area overview.

“Something that cannot be seen on the screendump is that when the operator ‘hovers’ the mouse index over the tab, a tab drop-down menu becomes available in which the operator can choose the detail view of that area/tab.

“This make navigating very easy and helps the operator to find the cause of an alarm quick without having to ‘drill down’ and search through other pages to get to the desired page.”

control system engineer in a process control philosophy document.

The quality of this document and the cooperation between process engineer and control system engineer determines the quality of the programming work and subsequently the operational readiness, and commissioning time of the plant.

“As this is a gold process every additional commissioning day is lost revenue,” Hilbers said.

“The challenge of having a high level of operational readiness made us make the decision to let the process engineer program the batch sequences.

“So the challenge presented to me was to have the most difficult part of the software to be programmed by someone without any programming experience. On top of this challenge, the batch sequencer itself was fairly complex as it needed to have automated fault handling functionality and be able to be run manually as well as automatically.

“I solved this by creating a class for a single batch sequence step by combining step sequence functionality with state machine functionality.

“This piece of software would monitor the current, previous and succeeding step and execute generic functions based on the health, step and conditions of the batch sequence.”

Wonderware Australia 1300 138 825 www.wonderware.com.au

PLC programming For the Chatree project, object oriented programming (OOP) was applied to the PLC program.

According to Hilbers, this was highly efficient for the batch sequences used for the chemical processes involved with leaching gold.

“Batch sequences are more challenging and difficult to program compared to other logic. Batch sequences are designed by a process engineer and are conveyed to the JUNE 2013 www.pacetoday.com.au 27

PA0613_028.pdf

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SPOTLIGHT

7best of the

PACE showcase of the best engineering technology releases of the month.

PC Control in compact Bus Coupler format The CX8090 Embedded PC is a complete PC controller that can perform different building automation functions inexpensively and in a space-saving Bus Coupler housing. The flexible communication options offer several advantages, with two Ethernet interfaces, realtime protocol performance and a direct connection to Beckhoff I/O systems for data acquisition of all signal types. A feature of the Beckhoff building automation solution is the scalable controller line up, which enables applications to be realised exactly to the individual requirements and at an optimum cost. The CX8090 Embedded PC offers the functionality of a PC controller and is universally suitable for use as a building, room or area controller, or as local intelligence for the control of HVAC, lighting and facades.

It has the Windows Embedded Compact operating system, 400 MHz ARM9 CPU, 64 MB DDR2 RAM and a MicroSD card, which can be extended up to 4 GB. The CX8090 is suitable for cost-sensitive applications where Embedded PCs with mid-range performance or higher are not necessary. It also has the benefit of having energy dissipation of 3W. In addition, the CX8090 is suitable for integrating I/O devices: the Beckhoff Bus Terminal system and the EtherCAT Terminal system can be connected directly to the Embedded PC. The CX8090 measures 65 x 100 x 80 mm and offers two Ethernet interfaces.

BECKHOFF Automation 03 9912 5430 www.beckhoff.com.au

High speed data acquisition Gantner Instruments Q.series data acquisition system is now available in Australia. The Q.series has been designed for the high speed, high accuracy measurements found in demanding performance testing environments. The modular concept allows the design of a system that meets the needs of the application at hand.

Q.series modules can be selected based on individual sensor measurement requirements including acquisition rate (from 100 Hz to 100 kHz per channel) and input/output type (dedicated, universal, multifunction). Modules are ‘hot swappable’ with auto-loading configurations and addressing, making system scalability and serviceability efficient. The system is available with various types of housings including portable, DIN rail and 19” rack mounted options. The Q.series offers an optimal signal acquisition and processing solution for electrical, thermal and mechanical data acquisition applications.

The custom designed measuring modules will allow measurement of strain values in strong magnetic field and temperatures as low 3 Kelvin.

Pacific Data Systems 07 3361 2000 www.pacdatasys.com.au

Ethernet for process control Bestech Australia is offering Micro-Epsilon adoptable Ethernet/EtherCAT technologies for a range of sensors applied in control automation and industrial measurement. Ethernet/IP employs star network technology and is a network communication standard capable of large amounts of data exchanging at a speed of 10Mbps or 100Mbps. An open Ethernet interface enables easy sensor integration to existing systems. Ethernet network technology is known for its high reliability, high data transmission rates, easy integration with existing networks and low hardware cost. Measurement data can be evaluated independent of the location. Ethernet or Ethernet/IP using star topology can be replaced by EtherCAT which employs a simple line structure or bus which can support any physical topology.

Bestech Australia 03 9540 5100 www.bestech.com.au 28 www.pacetoday.com.au JUNE 2013

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Email your product news to editor@pacetoday.com.au

Hygienic helical bevel gear units

Proximity switch has 75-mm switching distance

For hygienically demanding applications, Nord DriveSystems supplies aluminium two-stage helical bevel gear units in five sizes with a maximum torque of 660 Nm that are easy to clean. The washdown design is based on smooth inclined surfaces, transitions with large radii without dead spaces, and it requires no assembly covers. Cleaning liquids wash off easily and completely from the surfaces, which also remain considerably cooler than those of conventional drives due to the special construction. The design is optimised for use in the food industry and complies with international guidelines and standards such as EHEDG, ANSI / BISSC, and ANSI / NSF. If required, the gear units can be fitted with double shaft seals. They can be ordered as open or closed frame versions with hollow or solid shafts. Designed according to the Unicase principle, the housings are torsion-resistant and withstand high mechanical stress. With the optional NSD tupH surface treatment, they become resistant to corrosion as well as acids and alkaline solutions. Nord’s NSD tupH sealed surface conversion system is not a coating, which means that no layers can peel. Instead, the process transforms surfaces with up to seven times the hardness of the base aluminium material.

NORD Drivesystems 03 9394 0500 www.nord.com.au

Turck extends its uprox+ sensor range with a washdown variant in a Q80 housing. The non-flush inductive proximity switch detects all metals with the same switching distance of 75 mm. The sensor can be mounted partially embedded or fully flush – its switching sensitivity adjusts itself to the mounting conditions. With this degree of flexibility, the Q80WD is suitable for use in a wide range of applications, enabling users to effectively reduce the range of variants required. The sensor is available with a four-pin M12 connector and an antivalent PNP switch output. The application fields of the Q80WD are varied, ranging from gap detection in filling beverage cans to switching tasks on materials handling systems in washdown environments, in addition to outdoor applications on railway tracks. The Q80 washdown is the only 80mm rectangular sensor that comes with protection to IP68/ IP69K, and is therefore also suitable for applications in the food and beverage industry. All housing materials are FDA-compliant and are able to withstand typically used high-pressure cleaners and aggressive cleaning agents. The robust design is a benefit of the Q80 washdown sensor which is also useful for outdoor applications. The fully encapsulated proximity switch cannot be damaged by dew and condensation water.

Wireless cable replacer supports P2MP ZigSense model ZS-P2MP-002 is a new addition to the ZS-P2P-001 wireless cable replacer system. It supports Point To Multi-Point (P2MP) technology transferring wired sensors data and I/O control commands between a local Master node and two Slave nodes installed in separate remote locations. High speed communications combined with ZigSense P2MP bi-directional data transfer enable digital and analog signals to be reliably transferred over short, medium or long distances using license-free 2.4GHz, 900MHz or 868MHz radio frequencies. Analog signals and digital conditions (pumps, motors, start/stop switches, alarm conditions) can be exchanged simultaneously between a Master node in location ‘A’ and two Slave nodes in locations ‘B’ and ‘C’ eliminating the need for long cables, conduits or cable trenches. Upon loss of communications ZigSense wireless cable replacer nodes will deactivate their outputs based on the default FailSafe mode.

TURCK Australia 1300 132566 www.turck.com.au

ZigSense 03 9842 7711 www.zigsense.com.au

Portable sludge blanket level detector The Sludge Gun is a handheld detector that helps wastewater plants monitor sludge interface levels in clarifiers, tanks and lagoons. It allows users to eliminate unnecessary pumping and optimise sludge density before subsequent processing. Using a high-intensity infrared light beam, it detects densities ranging from light flocs to thick blankets.

As the sensor is lowered, an audible tone varies in volume and pitch, depending upon the concentration of solids.

The sludge blanket and overlying cloudy layer are located by observing depth markers on the cable. The device is compact, weatherproof and suitable for use from boats and boardwalks. No calibration is necessary.

Chemtrack 02 9587 4988 www.chemtrack.com.au JUNE 2013 www.pacetoday.com.au 29

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CONNECTIONS

5

minutes with...

I have a passion for golf but if I was to turn pro I would starve.

Rafael Koenig, Chairman, Profibus and Profinet Australia How did you come to be in this industry?

I started as an apprentice radio and television mechanic and then studied electrical engineering. About 20 years ago I was doing customer presentations in the Asia Pacific region with a company who opened a subsidiary in Australia. What started with a three year stint as a Product Manager has expanded into more than 17 years in the industry. The reason I’m still here is either I like it so much or, as some people say, they wouldn’t let me back into Germany.

What’s the best business idea you have that you will never use?

Three years after coming over from Germany with my wife, we had our daughter. With no family support network here I came up with the idea of opening a business called “Renta-Granny” as I thought the influence for kids from people with life experience is probably better than having teenage baby sitters. I recently heard that somebody else has now

come up with this idea and wish I had gone through with it.

What do you see are the biggest opportunities for our industry?

A lot of the technology expertise that is currently in the workforce at customer level is with the baby boomers and many of them are about to go into their well-deserved retirement in the next three to five years.

In addition we see strong trends related to outsourcing of automation expertise at end user and even EPC level. This is a great opportunity for suppliers and specialist engineering firms who are prepared to invest in the knowledge of their people to adapt their business model to include specialist automation services as a core value stream.

What’s the greatest challenge in your job?

For me the greatest challenge is keeping up with the rapid technological changes that are currently happening in automation. In our

industry, very few automation manufacturers invest locally in R&D in Australia. Europe or North America are a bit closer to the pulse as most market leaders originate from there.

To stay in touch, I make a conscious effort to network at the source and am involved with global networks such as Profibus and Profinet International.

If you could be anything else, what would it be and why?

I am pretty happy with what I am doing.

Outside work I have a passion for golf, but if I was to turn pro, I would starve. Also there doesn’t appear to be a market niche for German comedians in Australia. One of the things I enjoyed most in my life was being a student. So if there was ever the job of being a professional student...

[Rafael Koenig is A&C Manager, Pentair Actuation & Control.]

Rafael.Koenig@pentair.com 02 9794 3578 www.profibuscentre.com.au

FUTURE WATCH

Industrial Internet is next growth area The addition of intelligence will take mechanical devices to the next level, writes Jim Pinto.

TO SMALLER companies, looking for the next big thing is like looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack.

For large companies like GE, it’s easier because GE can plan far ahead and invest billions. When GE identifies a market, it’s big and it means they are getting ready to dominate.

GE has announced that it is targeting the industrial Internet as the next big growth arena. In a recent shareholder letter CEO Jeffrey Immelt outlined the company’s technology and market plans: “We are making a major investment in software and analytics. We know that industrial companies need to be in the software business. We want to make the analytics around our products, real-time data, and operating solutions a GE core 30 www.pacetoday.com.au JUNE 2013

competency. We have built a Software and Analytical Center of Excellence in California, where we are adding a vast array of human talent to achieve our goals. We know that our services in the coming years depend on building smarter machines with the ability to extract and analyse data. This is the power of the Industrial Internet.”

Immelt continues: “The industrial Internet leverages the power of the cloud to connect machines embedded with sensors and sophisticated software to other machines (and to us) so we can extract data, make sense of it and find meaning where it did not exist before. Machines – from jet engines to gas turbines to CT scanners – will have the analytical intelligence to self-

diagnose and self-correct. They will be able to deliver the right information to the right people, all in real time. When machines can sense conditions and communicate, they become instruments of understanding. They create knowledge from which we can act quickly, saving money and producing better outcomes.”

Immelt’s industrial Internet speaks to the addition of intelligence, via sensors and connected networking technology, to take mechanical devices to the next level. This concept is indeed something we’ve often discussed as the next big industrial growth arena: The Internet of Things (IoT).

For a giant like GE, which makes everything from locomotive engines to light bulbs, this means products that

are smart enough to help themselves.

We’ve been writing about the pervasive Internet and IoT for years, and now GE is identifying it as a targeted growth arena.

Immelt says industrial demand for increases in productivity will help drive this market transformation, whether for healthcare or transportation or energy.

The size of this opportunity?

Immelt says this market could be about US$15 trillion by 2030. He estimates this to be the equivalent of adding another US economy to the world.

I have never, ever come across any market forecasts of this magnitude.

The Internet of Things era has begun. What do you think?

Jim@Jimpinto.com

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