SPECIAL REPORT
STATE OF TECHNOLOGYPOWER SYSTEMS
From sourcing and ensuring uninterrupted flows of clean electricity to monitoring, regulating and metering gen-eration and consumption throughout a facility, process automation professionals who want a smooth-running, efficient and reliable facility are well advised to seek and control power. This anthology of recent articles delves into the many aspects of power systems of interest in process plants.
Remote and wireless systems are speeding development and standardization of energy harvesting and improved battery systems. Line-powered supplies that used to only transform electricity and maybe offer surge protection are now monitoring and measuring current and voltage profiles, implementing alerts and alarms, and sending data up to higher-level systems for analysis and optimi-zation. And forward-thinking engineers are demanding increased integration of process and power automation systems.
Read on for our latest articles on power systems, and you can always find more at www.ControlGlobal.com.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
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State of Technology: Power Systems 2
STANDARDIZATION COMING FOR WIRELESS 4 SENSOR POWER SOURCES
LITHIUM ION BATTERIES COME TO UPS 6
BRAIN POWER FOR POWER SUPPLIES 8
EXXONMOBIL TAKES ON ELECTRICAL INTEGRATION 10
PROCESS AND POWER/ELECTRICAL CONTROLS 12MERGING INTO UNIFIED SYSTEMS
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State of Technology: Power Systems 4
Standardization coming for wireless sensor power sourcesDocuments are in development to define general requirements, batteries and energy harvesting that allow for use of C- and D-cells.
By Ian Verhappen, P.Eng.
With the abundance of wireless devices coming onto the market, one of the requirements they
all need is power. Because wireless devices typically aren’t connected to a permanent power
supply, they also need the ability to store this power, hence some form of energy storage, in
most cases a battery. We’re all familiar with the standard sizes and connections for the batteries
we use in battery-powered devices, which to no one’s surprise are standardized, in this case in
the IEC 60086 series.
SC 65B WG16, under the leadership of Ludwig Winkel, who’s also the convener for the fieldbus
standards, is in the process of developing three standards for “Power sources for a wireless
communication device.” The three documents in development are IEC 62952-1 Ed 1.0, Power
sources for a wireless communication device–Part 1, General requirements of power modules;
Part 2, Profile for power modules with batteries; and Part 3, Energy harvesting. Parts 1 and 2
should be published in September this year, while Part 3 will be released by the end of 2017. All
three documents are far enough along that manufacturers are able to incorporate the concepts
in their devices today.
As with most multipart standards, the task for Part 1 is specifying the general requirements, and
because IEC SC65B is concerned with process automation applications, the developed stan-
dards must also address the use and replacement of devices in explosive atmospheres. One
aspect of this is the temperature classification, so Part 1 states the power module shall be usable
for temperature class T4 (maximum surface temperature of 135 °C) at ambient temperature of
60 °C and optionally to 80 °C, while complying with temperature class T3 (maximum surface
temperature of 200 °C) at an ambient temperature of 80 °C.
Other mechanical and physical requirements include continuing to operate under the following
conditions: ambient temperature range -40 °C to 85 °C with a rate of temperature change of 0.5
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State of Technology: Power Systems 5
°C per minute while the power module (and its
connections) shall be able to withstand vibra-
tion at 2–9 Hz at 10 mm displacement and
9–200 Hz at 3 g (30 m/s2), as well as Type II
shock with peak acceleration 25 g (250 m/s2)
with no mechanical damage or interruption of
the electrical connection.
Part 1 also defines three different formats that
the power source (whose output shall not
exceed 20 V) can take: primary or secondary
batteries (Type A); a mechanical unit that con-
tains primary or secondary batteries (Type B);
or a generic energy-harvesting adapter mod-
ule (GEHAM) with a backup battery (Type C).
Part 2 builds on Part 1 by defining the bat-
tery profile, and provides selection criteria
for a battery with a mechanical interface as
given by the battery dimensions and electri-
cal characteristics specified in IEC 60086-1
and IEC 60086-2 (primary batteries). Type A
and Type B power modules shall use C-cell
or D-cell batteries as specified in IEC 60086-
1. The profile also specifies the lifecycle of a
power module from storage, maintenance
and operation, including disposal, as well as
guidelines related to transport and exchange/
replacement of the power source in an intrin-
sically safe environment.
The final document specifies requirements
and a profile for a power source containing
a generic energy harvesting adapter module
(GEHAM), and is based on the lowest-com-
mon-denominator approach by specifying
the minimum requirements to enable suppli-
ers and purchasers to reliably acquire devices
that work together from multiple vendors.
Electrically, the GEHAM shall accept, as a
minimum, any energy harvester output up to
100 mW and 12 V DC (maximum), while the
output voltage shall be DC, non-regulated
and the ripple shall not exceed the stated
maximum output voltage. The GEHAM output
voltage shall be clearly labeled, identifying it
as a nominal 5 VDC (for a nominal single, 3.6
V battery load) or 8 VDC (for a nominal dual,
7.2 V battery load).
In cases where a connector is used, IEC 61076-
2-101 M12 A-Coded connectors shall be used
with male connectors on both devices, mean-
ing the cable ends shall be female on both
ends. The connector can use from two to five
conductors, and shall follow the following pin
out and cable colors: Pin 1–ground (brown); Pin
2–communications (white); Pin 3–power (blue);
Pin 4–sense (black); and Pin 5–reserved (gray).
The above represents a significant amount of
work by the members of SC65E WG16 that, as
you can see, will certainly help with the adop-
tion of wireless field sensors by defining how
each of these devices will be powered and
the requirements for manufacturers of those
power supplies to interface to the devices.
Ian Verhappen’ P.Eng. is an ISA Fellow’ ISA Certified
Automation Professional (CAP)’ and a member of the
Automation Hall of Fame. Ian is a recognized author-
ity on Foundation Fieldbus’ industrial communications
technologies and process analyzer systems. Verhappen
provides consulting services on field level industrial com-
munications’ process analytics and heavy oil / oil sands
automation. Feedback is always welcome via e-mail ati-
[email protected] or on his Kanduski blog at http://
community.controlglobal.com/kanduski.
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State of Technology: Power Systems 6
Lithium ion batteries come to UPSThe next COTS technology waiting to take hold in process automation is lithium-ion batteries.
By Dan Hebert, PE, senior technical editor, Control
Remember when the PC was introduced back in the early 1980s? Most thought it would
never be reliable enough for any type of process automation application. Fast forward 35
years, and it’s impossible to find a DCS without PCs at the server level, and many end users
are employing industrial PCs as real-time controllers.
Ethernet is another commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) technology that has taken the process
automation world by storm after much early skepticism. End users were wary of its lack of
determinism, inability to deliver power and high cost. These challenges were met by Ether-
net speed increases, Power over Ethernet and ever improving price/performance ratios.
And along with Ethernet, other COTS communications technologies are moving into the
industrial realm including the Internet, web servers, browsers, cellular networks and Wi-Fi.
Many process control system components now contain a built-in web server and an Ether-
net port. Connecting them to the Internet gives worldwide browser access, often powered
by cellular communication networks or Wi-Fi.
According to Bedrock Automation, the next COTS technology waiting to take hold in pro-
cess automation is lithium-ion batteries. They’re a much better foundation for uninterrupt-
ible power systems (UPS) than lead-acid batteries.
“Automotive electrification and consumer mobility has been the catalyst for significant bat-
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State of Technology: Power Systems 7
tery improvements in the past decade, with
emphasis on lithium-ion chemistries,” says
Albert Rooyakkers, Bedrock’s founder, CTO
and vice-president of engineering.
According to Rooyakkers, Bedrock has
“developed the next-generation industrial
control system with a revolutionary electro-
magnetic backplane architecture and deep-
ly embedded cybersecurity for the highest
levels of system performance, security and
reliability at the lowest system cost.”
A key component of Bedrock’s new control
system is its UPS, which also can be used to
power control systems from other suppliers.
“Lithium-ion batteries are sealed and can
be mounted in any orientation in our UPS,
while lead-acid batteries must be vented
and mounted upright. Lead-acid batteries
can also give off gas or leak toxic chemicals
in the event of damage or overcharging,
preventing them from being sealed,” ex-
plains Rooyakkers.
“Lithium-ion batteries charge faster than
lead-acid, can be up to five times lighter
and require three times lower volume than
lead-acid batteries with equivalent energy
capacity and cycle life,” adds Rooyakkers.
“All batteries consist of multiple cells, with
the number dependent upon the power
required. One design method is to stack the
cells and then monitor, control and contain
the stack. This is not the best way, although
it’s common with lead-acid designs,” he
notes.
“With lithium-ion batteries, each cell is engi-
neered as an independent system in a paral-
lel electronic topology. Our UPS battery
pack is thus less vulnerable to the status of
a single cell, and the charge and discharge
of each cell can be independently optimized
for safety and performance,” continues
Rooyakkers.
Bedrock assembles the lithium-ion cells,
electronics and connectors into a cell “ves-
sel” to ensure optimal alignment, contain-
ment and separation from every other cell
in the pack. The vessel provides for stress-
free thermal expansion and contraction dur-
ing charge cycles and temperate extremes,
as well as protection against vibration and
shock.
“Driven by severe criteria including NEMA
4X and FIPS 140, along with the require-
ment to withstand the most extreme
physical stresses, the result is a thick-walled
aluminum monolith. Our UPS is assembled
in a multi-ton press with water tight con-
nectors, and it can be field-mounted in any
orientation, either inside or outside of field
enclosures,” says Rooyakkers.
Dan Hebert is senior technical editor for Control
and Control Design. Email him at [email protected].
www.controlglobal.com
State of Technology: Power Systems 8
Brain power for power suppliesIf controllers and field devices already have diagnostics tool power, why can’t power supply devices have that too?
By Jim Montague
Everything is getting “smart,” and this trend appears to be holding true for power supplies
as well. Devices that used to only deliver power, convert it and maybe offer surge protec-
tion are now monitoring and measuring current and voltage profiles, implementing alerts
and alarms for predefined operating ranges, and sending data on power supply perfor-
mance up to higher-level systems and users for analysis and optimization efforts.
For instance, Richard Anderson, senior automation specialist at Solid State Automation and
Controls in Houston, Texas, reports in a whitepaper, “How to Develop Cost-Effective, Rug-
gedized, Skid-Based Applications for Remote Deployments,” that SSAC recently designed
and built a viscosity-reducing, skid-based, oil-mixing system for an unmanned produc-
tion platform in the Gulf of Mexico, and employed Siemens Industry’s Siplus S7-1200 PLCs,
ET200M I/O modules, MP377 HMIs and two power supplies in an explosion-proof, NEMA 7
enclosure and intrinsically safe track pad.
The two power supplies consist of two Sitop units, both capable of 24 Vdc and 120 Vac with
a redundancy module between them. They support and maintain high availability on the
skid’s equally redundant PLCs, which pull data from a flow sensor, and use 4-40 mA ana-
log wiring, HART, Profibus and Profinet communications protocols and Siemens’ Scalance
wireless modules to transmit it to the user’s onshore DCS. Likewise, S7-1200 PLCs can also
use Modbus RTU and Modbus TCP for communicating between legacy RS-232 and RS-485
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State of Technology: Power Systems 9
systems and industrial Ethernet, while Sitop
1600 DC uninterruptible power supplies
have two Ethernet ports for integrating with
Profinet and reporting to users’ higher-level
networks.
I’d add not to take my word that power sup-
plies are getting smarter, but I can’t because
when I researched this topic, I ran across two
articles I wrote on it last year and the year
before. In the earlier article, “Power Supplies
Take Sophisticated Paths,” Roolf Wessels,
business unit manager for monitoring and
protection at Pepperl+Fuchs, said, “Power
supplies have always been a bit of a stepchild
compared to other process control devices,
but users are recognizing that power is the
most critical element in their applications.
You can lose a few I/O points and networking
nodes and still run an application, but losing
power means losing your whole application,
so it’s worthwhile investing in high-reliability,
high-efficiency power. As a result, users want
more diagnostics in their power supplies.
They already have diagnostics for predictive
maintenance and asset management in their
controllers and field devices, and now they
want it them their power supplies, too.”
In the more recent article, “Power Supplies
Get in on the Reliability Act,” Mike Garrick,
power supply manager at Phoenix Contact,
added, “Applications become more robust
when a power supply can report when its
connected field devices are drawing too
much current, while the integrity of the DC
bus is intact. For example, if the system is de-
signed for 10 amps, it’s become a reasonable
expectation for the power supply to provide
a signal to the process controller when the
load starts to draw more than 10 amps. This
signal is an early warning that the load is
drawing too much current, and maintenance
should be scheduled. When this early warning
is received, the controller knows the process
is running at the proper voltage at a current
beyond the nominal rating of the supply. The
reason for this could be a field device that’s
getting old and requires service.”
Jim Montague is executive editor of Control maga-
zine, and has served as executive editor of Control
Design and Industrial Networking magazines. He’s
worked for Putman Media for more than 10 years,
and has covered the process control and automation
technologies and industries for almost 20 years. He
holds a B.A. in English from Carleton College and lives
in Skokie, Illinois.
“Users already have diagnostics for predictive
maintenance and asset management in their
controllers and field devices, and now they want
them in their power supplies too.”
www.controlglobal.com
State of Technology: Power Systems 10
ExxonMobil takes on electrical integrationThe company’s latest effort to simplify and streamline capital project execution.
By Keith Larson, group publisher, Control
ExxonMobil made waves across the process automation industry by championing the
concept of configurable input/output (I/O) sub-systems to reduce project execution
risk, a methodology that has since been adopted across industry. Now Sandy Vasser and
his team of electrical and instrumentation engineers at ExxonMobil Development Com-
pany have taken up the cause of electrical integration to further simplify capital project
execution and help to bring the company’s often multi-billion-dollar efforts in on time
and on schedule.
“We continue to challenge everyone on things that we can continue to improve,” Vasser
said in his keynote address to the 2015 Honeywell Users Group Americas conference
today in San Antonio. The automation group has made terrific strides toward taking
its work off the critical project path, Vasser said. “Now we’re challenging the electrical
group to do the same.”
Electrical energy is a vital input to process manufacturing operations, often secondary
only to raw materials. And, just as the flow of process fluids through pipes, valves and
vessels typically is controlled by a dedicated process automation system, the flow of
electrons through transformers, circuit breakers and motors is the traditional domain of
a dedicated electrical control and monitoring system (ECMS). Historically, both types of
systems work largely independently to ensure safe, uninterrupted production. Indeed,
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State of Technology: Power Systems 11
the differing dynamics of electrical and
process phenomena has led over the years
to the development of parallel systems,
suppliers and support organizations for
each type of system.
But for ExxonMobil, those days are gone.
“We’re completely eliminating the ECMS,”
Vassar said, noting that a modern distrib-
uted control system (DCS) can readily
take on electrical control and monitoring
tasks. “We need to take full advantage of
the power available in our systems today,”
Vasser said. Further, control systems that
speak IEC 61850, the language of intel-
ligent electronic devices (IEDs), allow fi-
beroptic network connectivity to banks of
low-voltage motor control centers, elimi-
nating the need for traditional hardwired
interlocks.
Like configurable I/O before it, electrical
integration satisfies ExxonMobil’s drive to
adopt new technologies and work pro-
cesses that are SCERT: simple, capital-
efficient, robust and timeless, according to
Vasser. The company also is applying this
philosophy to its capital project procure-
ment processes, replacing the traditional
specification development and bidding
process with pre-selected, standardized
equipment that can be ordered by part
number or customized through data sheet
parameters, whenever possible. “The
project team will create data sheets, not
specifications,” Vasser said, “and we’ll do
this at each level of the electrical infra-
structure.”
Keith Larson is group publisher responsible for Put-
man Media’s manufacturing automation titles Con-
trol and Control Design. Corporately, he also serves
as vice president of content across Putman Media’s
other magazine titles.
“We’re completely eliminating
the ECMS.” ExxonMobil’s Sandy
Vasser on the company’s drive
to bring process automation and
electrical controls functionality
into a single unified system.
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State of Technology: Power Systems 12
Process and power/ electrical controls merging into unified systemsHere are the benefits they can provide together.
By Jim Montague, executive editor, Control
The ones and zeroes don’t care what physics or events they represent. Pressure, tempera-
ture, flow, oil, gas, chemicals, water, ore, slurries, pulp or tapioca pudding—it’s all the same
to them. Likewise, mathematics, algorithms, software and microprocessors are equally will-
ing to chew on whatever digital data comes their way—and now it’s power and electrical
control’s turn to join the process automation party.
The separation between process control and power is one of the oldest organizational bar-
riers on the plant floor. However, digital data is starting to flow more freely between them,
and their convergence is allowing users to achieve many and varied gains, improve efficien-
cy and reliability, and reduce costs at the same time.
“We’re seeing demand for integration of electrical control and process control across the
board among our clients from hydropower to large production plants, mostly due to greater
awareness of the IEC 61850 standard,” says Brian Harrison, president of Coast Automa-
tion Inc., a CSIA-member system integrator in Vancouver, B.C. “I think it began six or seven
years ago, when users tried to settle on a common programming language based on the
IEC 61131 standard, and then this commonality spread via the fieldbuses and Ethernet-based
protocols. Of course, everyone is looking for efficiency and energy savings, and IEC 61850
lets them look at power use at the production level, add meters to their motors and drives,
and monitor their consumption and efficiency on a combined SCADA package.”
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State of Technology: Power Systems 13
Debbie Colclazier, product marketing man-
ager for DeltaV engineering tools at Em-
erson Process Management, confirms that
power and process control systems are
coming together. She recently returned to
Emerson from working for eight years at a
U.S. oil and gas refinery, and reports its staff
could see benefits from combining power
and process systems.
“We put in a large compressor with a
variable-speed drive at the refinery where
I worked,” says Colclazier. “The compres-
sor had its own substation, breaker control
and PLC. The interface to the PLC from
the DCS, combined with hardwired inputs,
allowed operators to initiate sequences
needed for starting or stopping the com-
pressor. The interface consisted of a se-
quenced set of communications between
the PLC and the DCS to open and close
breakers as needed, as well as providing
the status of the sequenced events to the
operators. In the past, electronic devices
used in substations had their own PLC-
type controls that could interact with a
main PLC to monitor and control those de-
vices. The DCS controls and the electrical
substation controls have remained primar-
ily separate until now, with maybe only a
few values being integrated via Modbus to
the DCS.”
HAPPIER TOGETHER—IN BRAZILThe benefits of combining and coordinat-
ing electrical and process controls and
their related systems can be huge, and
achieve unprecedented efficiencies and
joint performance gains. For instance, at
Petrobras’ Presidente Getúlio Vargas (Re-
par) refinery just north of Araucária, Brazil,
engineers report that integrated process
and power systems from ABB have saved
30% in engineering costs, 14% in installation
time and 20% in training costs, according to
Leandro Monaco, global product manager
for ABB’s 800xA system and electrical inte-
gration (Figure 1).
TWO BECOME ONEFigure 1: Integration of process and power on ABB’s System 800xA includes common interfaces that can access substation automation, electrification, instrumentation, safety devices and controls via vari-ous fieldbus protocols, IEC 61850’s manufacturing message specification (MMS) and generic, object-oriented substation event (GOOSE) messag-ing. Credit: ABB
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State of Technology: Power Systems 14
Likewise, Vale S.A.’s huge iron ore mine in
Carajás, Brazil, has been working with ABB
to develop an integrated, remote asset
management and predictive maintenance
program for the mine’s electrical systems,
which would also improve its planned en-
ergy efficiency. “The ideal management of
a plant isn’t just increasing production, but
is also relating that production to energy
consumption,” state Monaco and Jose
Catarino, Vale’s automation and electrical
coordinator, who co-authored a whitepa-
per on the project. “Production depends
on the electrical system always being on,
but users don’t want to know more than
that they can always plug in and run their
process, even though one electrical device
failure can shut that production down. So
power systems don’t get much attention,
most electrical maintenance has been
mainly corrective, and this usually means
hours of lost production.”
These efficiencies are crucial because the
mine represents an almost $19.5-billion
total investment, and when it begins pro-
duction shortly, its 2,600 employees are
expected to produce 90 million tonnes of
iron ore per year. This will reportedly make
it the second-biggest iron ore mine in the
world behind Vale’s other Brazil-based
mine that produces 130 million tonnes per
year. However, it will use a truckless sys-
tem, which will reduce diesel fuel costs by
71% compared to its sister mine, so elec-
tricity will be its highest raw material cost.
Its electrical system will have 73 km of
230-kV transmission lines, 77 disconnec-
tors and reclosers, and 135 medium-voltage
(MV) substations with 1,500 to 2,000 intel-
ligent electronic devices (IEDs). The mine’s
processing plant will have 30 substations,
including one high-voltage and 29 MV, as
well as 500 IEDs and 12,000 MV and low-
voltage (LV) motors.
“One study showed that 63% of electrical
maintenance hours resulted in no needed
action, which is a big drain on labor,” ex-
plain Monaco and Catarino. “And a second
study showed that 62% of plants use pre-
ventive maintenance or just run to failure,
which is not good because electrical equip-
ment is high-value and can cause produc-
tion to stop. We’re proposing one way to
do predictive maintenance. Bringing in
open/close counts, trip counts, operating
current values, spring-charging times and
trip circuit supervision data into an asset
management function of a unified automa-
tion system for process and electrical ap-
plications can help avoid these traditional
problems. Combining production data and
energy consumption also enables greater
energy efficiency. We have to measure
precisely and in real time how energy is
coming into the plant; check how it’s being
distributed to each production area; do de-
tailed measurements down to the LV and
MV motors; and monitor the real-time ratio
between plant production rates and energy
used.”
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State of Technology: Power Systems 15
They add the plant uses a fiberoptic net-
work with all meters and switchgear in one
place and logic interlocks between relays.
This reduced cable requirements by 110 km
and enabled implementation of MV motors
that comply with the International Electro-
technical Commission’s IEC 61850 standard
(see “The basics of IEC 61850”). “Vale has
also saved about 4 million man-hours in
pulling cables and in installing, commission-
ing, testing and maintaining devices,” added
Monaco. “The mine also needed 83% fewer
power meters in its substations, but has the
same functions, gets the same information
from its automation systems, and receives
per equipment and plant reports. As a re-
sult, it also needs 75% fewer maintenance
personnel.”
SAVED BY SUBSTATION STANDARDIZATIONDespite present and future gains, the path
to electrical/process control integration has
been long and circuitous, but it began to
straighten and shorten with the advent of
standards like IEC 61850 for designing elec-
trical substation automation.
“In many regards, integration of process
and power control has been happening for
a long time,” says Paul Vellacott, solutions
marketing manager for SCADA systems
at Honeywell Process Solutions. “What’s
changed is relays have gotten smarter, and
with standards like IEC 61850, more data
and control is reliably available via com-
munications interfaces. The realization now
is it’s not absolutely necessary to have
these as completely separate systems. Load
shedding, power control, mode control,
synchronization and other functions can be
performed from the same type of HMI and
controller. It’s just the end devices that are
different, though I don’t think we’re at the
stage of networks coming completely to-
gether. In fact, many aspects of load shed-
ding can be configured in the IED network,
rather through a separate PLC. And when
something goes wrong, the operator has ac-
cess to all the information, not just process,
so if a high-voltage relay tripped at the
same time, they can be analyzed together.
And maintenance teams can make decisions
remotely about how to fix the situation and
even change IED parameters, so there’s no
need to punch local panels anymore.”
FASTER PROJECTS, POWERFUL PICTURESBeyond improving project design, setup
and routine operations, combined electri-
cal/process controls can help save plenty
of power—and show users how they’re
doing it.
Harrison reports that Coast worked with
renewable energy provider Innergex in 2014
to build controls for a 50-MW, run-of-river
hydropower plant in British Columbia, which
was greatly simplified and streamlined by
combining its electrical and process con-
trols. The project implemented Schneider
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State of Technology: Power Systems 16
Electric’s Unity software in three M340
PLCs and used its Wonderware System
Platform SCADA software and chart-server-
based, unified design platform.
“All its controls have familiar interfaces,
common function-block programming
and tag naming conventions, and unified
interfaces to all power devices,” explains
Harrison. “These all made the project, com-
missioning and training easier. We had
less programming and spaghetti code, and
easier troubleshooting. Compared to a
similar plant we did previously that didn’t
combine power and process controls, I think
we spent 25-50% fewer hours on commis-
sioning and saved 10% on engineering time,
even though more time was spent at the
beginning.”
Likewise, Honeywell reports its Experion
PKS Orion control system also supports
IEC 61850 across its automation hierarchy
with a SCADA interface connecting Ex-
perion’s HMI to electrical substations and a
control-level Series C interface to connect
process controllers directly to IEC 61850
devices. By providing the power and elec-
trical management information directly to
the operator and the power control infor-
mation directly to the process controllers,
Experion and IEC 61850 substations be-
come a single process and power automa-
tion solution (Figure 2).
UNIFIED POWER/PROCESS PLATFORMFIGURE 2: By providing power and electrical management data directly to operators and power con-trol data directly to process controllers, Experion PKS Orion from Honeywell Process Solutions and IEC 61850 substations become one process and power automation solution. Credit: Honeywell
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State of Technology: Power Systems 17
TOOLS FOR COOPERATIONTo help users take advantage of unified
power/process controls, many suppliers are
developing software and devices they can
use to tailor newly combined systems to
their applications, monitor and coordinate
their performance and gain the most inef-
ficiencies from them.
Colclazier reports that Emerson is using the
IEC 61850 manufacturing message specifi-
cation (MMS) protocol in its new Ethernet
I/O Card (EIOC), which can talk to 256 dif-
ferent devices, handle 32,000 signals and
will be released with its DeltaV distributed
control system, Version 13.3, in September.
“MMS brings monitoring and supervisory
control of electrical subsystems to the DCS,
as the EIOC can connect directly to the IEDs
to read process variables and display them
for the operator in DeltaV,” explains Colcla-
zier. “In the past, some variables could be
delivered via Modbus and serial interfaces
to a substation PLC, but users had to de-
cide and program values that needed to be
mapped for integration purposes. And since
the systems are dealt with totally separately
within organizations, this was rarely done.
“With the IEC 61850 MMS protocol, we can
read and write data directly to/from IEDs.
EIOC can deliver information from the IED
without a gateway or PLC, which allows re-
al-time monitoring and supervisory control.
Any IED supporting the IEC 61850 protocol
can be added to the EIOC network. Imagine
being able to bring the information from all
the substation devices into one place, the
DCS, where you can have alarms monitored
by operators and help prevent substation
events. This gives users the ability to histor-
ize values and events to help troubleshoot
substation events. This means less need for
laptops in the field, connecting to the devic-
es for data and no need for separate moni-
toring systems for each vendor’s devices,
from which it’s difficult or impossible to get
data into a plantwide historian. The EIOC
breaks the chain of the disjointed monitor-
ing of electrical substations by connecting
IEDs directly to the DCS.”
Bruce Jensen, manager of systems product
management at Yokogawa Corp. of America,
reports, “Our philosophy for integrating
power and electrical systems is to make
them subsystems of the process automa-
tion system. Yokogawa employs its Unified
Gateway Station (UGS), which uses the
Yokogawa NIC card for access to the control
LAN and an Ethernet physical interface to
the electrical/power subsystem. UGS bridg-
es the Ethernet interface of the electrical/
power system and the Vnet/IP protocol of
its Centum VP DCS system, and provides the
structure to create a tag and parameters of
the interested data.
“Once a tag is on the control LAN, all sta-
tions on the control highway can use the
data in the same manner as hardwired,
connected process data, including opera-
www.controlglobal.com
State of Technology: Power Systems 18
tor graphics, OPC interface to supervisory
systems, and in KPI calculations. Yokogawa
also provides an integrated operation and
monitoring IEC 81650 browser in its UGS
builder, which uses MMS to access specific
information of interest.”
THE BASICS OF IEC 61850Much of the credit for enabling closer
integration of power and process controls
goes to the International Electrotechnical
Commission and its IEC 61850 standard for
Communication Networks and Systems in
Substations, including designing electrical
substation automation, and facilitating com-
munications and interoperability of intel-
ligent electronic devices (IEDs) in modern
power grids.
Issued in 2004, its objectives are to use
open protocols that support self-descrip-
tive devices; to make it possible to add new
functionality; to base its complete commu-
nication profile on existing communication
standards; to be founded on data objects
that relate to the needs of the power indus-
try; and to enable high interoperability of
IEDS from different manufacturers.
The heart of IEC 61805 consists of object-
oriented data models that facilitate seman-
tic commonality of electrical infrastructure
functions among systems and devices. The
standard’s present edition also defines an
Ethernet-based, high-speed means of com-
municating generic object-oriented substa-
tion events (GOOSE) horizontally among
IEDs for interlocks and protection schemes,
as well as a TCP/IP-based manufacturing
message specification (MMS) for vertical
integration into supervisory systems.
While power transmission and distribution
systems were its main initial targets, IEC
61850 also affects power-generation and
process applications by increasing the vis-
ibility of operating and diagnostic data from
electrical assets. Electrical integration via
IEC 61850 provides seamless control room
access to real-time operational data and
diagnostics for integrated system users.
IEC 61850 also saves the hardwiring previ-
ously needed by the IEDs it helped replace.
Ethernet connectivity means I/O and its
former hardwiring aren’t required for com-
munication among IEDs, which means
fewer terminations, lower installation costs
and improved organization within substa-
tion cubicles. Also, its fiberoptic networks
mean communication links can run closer
to busbars without risking electromagnetic
interference.
Jim Montague is executive editor of Control maga-
zine, and has served as executive editor of Control
Design and Industrial Networking magazines. He’s
worked for Putman Media for more than 10 years,
and has covered the process control and automation
technologies and industries for almost 20 years. He
holds a B.A. in English from Carleton College and lives
in Skokie, Illinois.