Emerson Process Management launches new innovation centre

Emerson Process Management has introduced its Integrated Operations Initiative to address customers’ needs for streamlined decision-making, easily accessible expertise and the safe, collaborative collocation of essential personnel.

“Running safe, profitable production operations is becoming increasingly challenging in the locations our customers are working in,” said Peter Zornio, chief strategic officer of Emerson Process Management. “These locations are sometimes referred to as ‘the Four Ds’: dull, distant, dirty and dangerous. These are often places few people want to go. The cost and scarcity of skilled workers just compounds their challenges.”

To overcome these challenges and improve operational effectiveness, manufacturers are turning to a new model called Integrated Operations (iOps). While implementations vary, key ingredients include: collocation of cross-functional teams in more desirable locales, collaboration tools like video conferencing and other applications, real-time access to process and asset data and streamlined decision-making workflows.

To accelerate industry realisation of the benefits iOps can provide, Emerson has developed three distinctive offerings in its Integrated Operations Initiative:

• A comprehensive and scalable automation architecture
• A real-world lab to experience Integrated Operations, called the iOps Center
• Consulting services to help customers envision, plan and execute their own iOps strategy

Real-time access to essential information is fundamental to iOps and has been a core focus within Emerson for decades. Emerson’s innovation in key technologies is unmatched:  the world’s first fully digital plant architecture, the first fully digital safety system, the most robust wireless technology portfolio, remote/low-power field communications, the industry’s broadest offering of diagnostics-based ‘Pervasive Sensing’ instruments, and monitoring applications to convert this data into actionable information.  Each of these innovations is foundational to the Integrated Operations model as they provide real-time insight to actual conditions, giving personnel the confidence to make better decisions.

“Customers have steadily seen operational improvement for years by deploying smart automation technologies that provide them more data - more visibility - into what’s really happening,” said Jim Nyquist, group vice president for Emerson’s Process Systems and Solutions business. “But data alone isn’t enough. The real opportunity is to imagine new organisational workflows, like the formation of cross-functional collaboration centres that bring together decentralised expertise to enable better, faster decision-making.”

Second, to give customers a clear sense of what’s possible in the future of Integrated Operations, Emerson has recently opened its state-of-the-art iOps Center in Austin, Texas.  A real-world, working model of a production enterprise, customers can experience the next generation of collaboration and real-time, multidisciplinary decision-making.

iOps Center opening. Left to right: David Farr, Chairman and CEO, Emerson; Rick Perry, Texas Governor; Michael Dell, Chairman and CEO, Dell; Jim Nyquist, President, PlantWeb Solutions, Emerson Process Management.

“We worked for nearly two years on the vision and execution of the iOps Center,” said Nyquist, “partnering with industry leaders ranging from Dell, Barco, Cisco, Mynah Technologies, OSISoft and more.”

“The enthusiasm and support for this project from our partner companies has been outstanding,” continued Nyquist. “We are able to showcase leading-edge technologies in virtualisation, video collaboration, telecommunications and more.”

The command centre is a state-of-the-art facility that brings together different business functions, such as production operations, maintenance, logistics and commodities trading into a collaborative control room environment.

In the command centre, Emerson can run and monitor the local process in the facility as well as remotely located facilities. Integrated videoconferencing and IP video cameras provide visibility into remote operations, and dashboards are used to monitor the health of assets around the world. Connections to subject-matter experts across Emerson allow the iOps team to have access to the right knowledge to optimise control system performance and reliability of assets including pumps, compressors, instruments, valves, and the DeltaV digital automation system.  This provides customers with a true-to-life look at potential technologies and work processes as they try to optimise the reliability and performance of their own operations.

Emerson Process Management iOps Center, Austin Texas.

The room is not limited to the operations environment, however. It also features a process skid with an oil and water mixing and separation process. This skid was designed and manufactured by Emerson’s Midwest Engineering Center and FABCON office in St Louis, Missouri, and is controlled and monitored almost completely by Emerson instrumentation, including Fisher valves and digital valve controllers, Rosemount transmitters, Micro Motion Coriolis flowmeters and CSI wireless vibration transmitters. The skid’s pumps are controlled by Emerson’s Control Techniques variable speed drives. These devices interface with the DeltaV control system through digital bus technologies including Foundation fieldbus, Profibus DP, AS-I and DeviceNet as well as through HART and WirelessHART. HART instrumentation is wired to field-mounted enclosures with all flavours of DeltaV’s Electronic Marshalling solution, including standard CHARMs, intrinsically safe CHARMs, and the newest product, DeltaV SIS Electronic Marshalling, which is used for safety instrumented systems, fire and gas systems, and burner management systems.

The skid instrumentation is supplemented in part by software from another of Emerson’s partners, Mynah. Mynah’s MiMiC software provides high-fidelity process simulation of distillation columns and other unit operations, and allows for the use of the DeltaV systems’ advanced control applications to demonstrate optimised model predictive control, neural networks and other control strategies.

Chloride, an Emerson business unit, supplies UPS power to the DeltaV system and process skid. The advanced diagnostics of the UPS integrate with DeltaV and Emerson’s AMS Suite diagnostic software applications through a Profibus interface. This provides an easy-to-understand dashboard of UPS performance.

The operations and maintenance consoles themselves are also manufactured by Emerson and provide an electronically adjustable, ergonomic technical furniture solution for control rooms. Emerson’s Knurr team manufactures the furniture, which is integrated with DeltaV to allow for automatic furniture adjustment upon operator login or for manual adjustment directly from the operator’s display.

The command centre features a Barco OL-series LED-lit rear projection video wall. The 10 x 2 m video wall provides nearly 25 million pixels onto which operators can display their level 1 overview displays, closed circuit video feeds, KPI dashboards and other sources. Emerson’s operator interface combines with Barco’s CMS software to seamlessly send displays from operator consoles to collaboration areas on the video wall or to any other display in the facility, including mobile devices such as tablets. With one click, the content across all screens in the command centre can change, instantly transforming the environment from an integrated oil and gas production operation to a refinery, to a petrochemical complex or to a pharmaceutical plant.

Lastly, to help customers establish and execute their vision, Emerson has developed Integrated Operations Consulting Services. First, consultants help customers develop a vision for their operations, based on ever-growing best practices. Following human-centred design methods, Emerson works with customers to define roles and work practices and to also define applications targeted to individual user requirements. Then, consultants leverage Emerson’s deep project management roots to help customers put their vision into action. These recommendations are derived through onsite visits, personnel interviews, assessments and analysis. This service is performed by senior consultants with the right expertise to explore opportunities and alternatives for taking advantage of new integrated operations capabilities.

The Integrated Operations Initiative is already receiving enthusiastic engagement from some of the world’s leading production companies. Meetings in Emerson’s iOps Center have already surpassed initial projections and are expected to increase significantly in 2014. Emerson is currently evaluating plans to expand its network of customer experience centres around the globe to support growing demand.