Industries such as food and beverage manufacturing and consumer packaged goods (CPG) production are fast-moving environments, with high traceability and proof-of-quality requirements alongside  throughput demands. As such, automation offers a lot of benefits to operations — so changes to existing systems, or implementing new ones can be seen as a source of risk, rather than opportunity. Here, Sam Kirby, a Solutions Engineer for Novotek UK & Ireland, looks at how manufacturers in the food, beverage and CPG sectors can reliably and rapidly extend automation deployments. 

The food and beverage industry has a long history with automated systems. In fact, one of the first fully automated production processes was that of an automatic flour mill, in 1785. The industry has generally kept abreast of automation developments since then, allowing it to keep ahead of ever-growing demand. Similar is true of CPG production, particularly in recent years, as product innovation has become a key business strategy.

CPG and food and beverage production tend towards automation because, in both sectors, much of the workforce is at the field level. As such, connecting systems to gain greater visibility into equipment health, output performance and product quality is invaluable. This is nothing new; engineers have been undertaking such projects for years, In particular, firms in these sectors have firmly established the benefits of connectivity and supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems. 

“Efficient HMI” Concept – being delivered by GE Digital.

Experience serving the industrial sector has shown that in the most productive environments, SCADA systems present screen to operators that are easy to interpret. By having the operator’s work foremost in screen design, they can be up to 40%  more effective in spotting issue that require technical teams to resolve. Engineers can then respond faster to events on the production line. GE Digital has been delivering templates intended to support this “Efficient HMI” concept as part of their IFIX HMI/SCADA system. 

The templates, refine HMI displays to focus on the most critical information related to executing the work. This decluttered interface improves operator effectiveness in regular operation, and makes it easier to spot issues exceptions, with means improved situational awareness, and more focused reactions to such issues. The overall effect is a higher level of productivity, on measures such as machine utilisation, throughput and quality.

Following this approach, IFIX also features preconfigured sample systems that are aimed at elements of the food, beverage and CPG industries. For example, Novotek can supply the IFIX software with a preset tailored for juice plants, with a display that provides an overview of processes from raw material intake to filling and packaging. Beverage production engineers can run this system immediately following installation to gain an immediate assessment of how production is performing. Even where adaptation is needed, the templates provide working examples of both the efficient look-and-feel, and of the most modern approaches to the technical configuration underneath it all. So engineers and IT teams get a practical hand in furthering their technical knowledge, smoothing the adoption of new versions and related modern development tools. 

It’s not unusual for engineers to believe that preset templates might not adequately fit their unique operations, yet we’ve found that the preconfigured settings often provide a substantial benefit. Of course there is no substitute for testing this directly, which is why Novotek and GE Digital offer CPG companies and food and beverage manufacturers a free demo of IFIX to see how effectively the templates suit them. 

Automation may not necessarily be something new for the food, beverage and CPG sectors, but its continued evolution brings with it new implementation challenges and operational complexities. Novotek values the work by GE Digital on the Efficient HMI concept and application templates as they offer useful tools to customers to help them modernise quickly and safely. And by sharing the methods and example applications, the customer’s IT and engineering groups are given a helping hand in building a bridge from the technical realities of long-established SCADA systems to a more modern solution. 

As the UK’s industrial base continues to adapt to changes in business models, supply networks and trade environments, there’s an opportunity to tap into a massive hidden resource – the install base of HMI/SCADA systems deployed everywhere from power plants to food processors. Many of these systems were implemented in the 90s and 00s as part of the first wave of productivity investments – by supplying a way to visualise the critical elements of complex machines and processes, industrial firms improved the effectiveness of their front-line workers and supervisors, as well as the reliability of their operations. However, rather than a desire to gain a more operational and competitive advantage, the pattern of investment during the previous 20 years has been driven by the feeling of “forced need.” As we’ve aided several clients with improvements to their SCADA systems, we’ve seen two things that influence their choice to upgrade:  

And an unfortunate sub-theme is common – we’re often told that any upgrade “must keep the system the same as the operators are used to”. No changes. No adoption of new functions. No assessment of whether current engineering practices could lead to a better, more maintainable footprint. “Convert the application and get it running again” is the instruction of the day. Even in cases where a firm has run an assessment of different providers and switched to a new SCADA vendor, they’ve then asked to have their old application replicated, rather than taking the upgrade work as a chance to consider what new capabilities might be delivered by the more modern SCADA platform that’s replacing the one from 20 or 30 years(!) ago.  

From the operations leaders’ perspectives, the core mission – make the product; keep the assets running – is the same, and it can be hard to step back, and consider whether the automation and systems around the operation should work the way they always have. And when vendors supply a laundry list of new features or technical updates, it doesn’t necessarily give an operational, maintenance or other non-technical leader compelling information in the right terms for them to see the value in taking that pause to step back and consider a broader approach to what first looked like a “forced necessity”. 

If we had the opportunity to be face to face with every as they took that step back, here’s what we recommend they consider: 

Where vendors spend their SCADA product development dollars IS driven by YOUR needs (yes, some technical, but many more are user/functional focused). Just a few examples would include: 

Using the more modern SCADA could save you time, effort and budget that would otherwise be spent on competing/overlapping new systems.  

OK – this one goes a little deeper into some technological details but stay with us! 

As firms pursue the value that may come from adoption of big data platforms and machine learning or analytics, they often launch data acquisition projects that without understand how existing plant systems part of the landscape can be, rather than driving additional tech into a plant where it may not be needed. 

Often, the IT and HQ operations teams don’t realise that their existing SCADA could accelerate these initiatives.  

Security – the elephant in the room 

It’s true that this is a topic that can cause people’s heads to throb before a discussion even gets started. But we’re going to skip all of the technical details and simply accept that improving cyber security postures is a priority for practical reasons, including: 

• Yup – there are bad actors. Anyone remember the last round of Wannacry incidents? 

• There are increasingly heavy regulatory burdens around certain industries or sectors 
• To the above point, I hear many of you exclaiming “But my firm isn’t part of Critical National Infrastructure!”. That may be true, but we’re even seeing scenarios where brand owners or retailers are insisting that their suppliers be able to prove that they have a solid cyber security position – as that’s seen as an indicator that they’ll be less subject to disruption, one way or another… 

Again, vendors haven’t been idle. It may take some basic work on the applications you have, but if you’ve at least invested in a current version of your SCADA, you’ll be able to take advantage of what’s noted below. 

Another area where IT teams struggle is understanding what can be done at the SCADA layer to meet security goals. As a result, they may consider some unique (and often extreme!) techniques and approaches that may be more difficult and expensive than needed. 

Click here to see what our vendors now have available! iFIX Secure Deployment Guide.

Don’t just “keep it current” – Upgrade!

Given the breadth of functions, capabilities, and technological upgrading that SCADA providers have implemented, it’s probably safe to argue that there’s more “in the box” that might be employed in areas that matter. And we’ve even reserved the details of the important technical things, such as development speed, part and code reusability, and so on, for another time! And we believe that looking at their SCADA with fresh eyes and thinking about what the current platform CAN do – rather than what the 20-year-old application created on the legacy platform from 1992 IS doing – is the key to gaining some new operational gains. And the route to those benefits can be faster to follow, making other digital projects speedier as well. 

In the age of connectivity, there is no shortage of useful information that engineers can leverage to optimise and improve operations. Everything from the speed of motors to the weather forecast can influence production. However, bringing these data sources together in a secure way is a challenge faced by many engineers. Here, George Walker, managing director of Novotek UK and Ireland, explains how engineers can bridge the gap between local process data and external data sources.

The Internet of Things (IoT) may still be a relatively new concept for many consumers and professional service businesses, but the idea of machine-to-machine communication and connectivity is nothing new for industry. In fact, it’s been more than 50 years since the programmable logic controller (PLC) first became popular among industrial businesses as a means of controlling connected systems.

The principle behind the PLC is quite simple: see, think and do. The controller will ‘see’ what is happening in a process based on the input data from the connected devices and machines. The PLC then processes this input and computes if any adjustments are required and if so, it signals these commands to the field devices. Traditionally, the field devices that could be controlled was limited, but recent developments in sensor technology have made specific components and resources much more measurable.

For example, if a water tank is almost at full capacity in a food processing plant, data from connected sensors can feed that information to a PLC. The PLC then sends the signal for the valve to close once the water volume exceeds a certain threshold, which prevents overflow. This is a simple control loop that sufficiently meets the need of the process.

Unfortunately, even as edge computing and PLC technology has advanced and offered more sophisticated data processing and control at the field-level, many plant engineers continue to setup their devices in this way. In reality, modern edge devices and industrial PCs (IPCs) are capable of providing much greater control, as well as responding to external commands or variables that were previously beyond the scope of control systems.

The outer loop

While the idea of the Industrial IoT (IIoT) is predominately a means of branding modern connectivity, the wider Industry 4.0 movement has brought with it some valuable advancements in edge and PLC technology. Among these advancements is the potential for on-premises automation and control systems to not only connect with local devices in an inner loop, but to draw from external sources: an outer loop.

The outer loop can take several forms, depending on what is most applicable or relevant to a process or operation.

For example, some more digitally mature businesses might have outer loops that feature an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, supply chain management software or a wider manufacturing execution system (MES). These systems will share and receive relevant information or send required adjustments — such as due to raw material intake or low stock — to an edge device, which feeds into the inner loop. This allows industrial businesses to make use of more comprehensive data analysis than can be achieved in local data systems.

Alternatively, an outer loop could draw from data sources that are completely external to a plant’s operations. For example, a wind farm operator could use an outer loop that drew from sources of meteorological data for wind forecasts. This could inform the optimum pitch and yaw of a turbine, controlled by a field device.

Another example, and one that will resonate with many industrial businesses, is energy price. The cost of power from the electrical grid fluctuates throughout the day, which might mean that on-site generation — such as solar panels or heat recovery processes — become more economical during times of peak grid demand. An outer loop can communicate this data efficiently to the relevant systems in a business, and changes can then be enacted that allow the business to reduce energy costs.

Establishing secure connection

Clearly, there is a benefit for industrial businesses to establish both inner and outer loops. However, there is one barrier to deployment that most engineers encounter: hardware limitations.

Traditional PLCs were designed in a rather utilitarian manner to complete control functions effectively and in a straightforward manner. This no-frills approach persists even with modern PLCs — even with today’s technical specifications, most PLCs are not designed in a way that struggles to handle much more than a real-time operating system and some control applications.

Attempting to set up such a PLC to interact with an outer loop would either not work at all or severely hinder performance and risk failure.

Engineers can tackle this problem by introducing a separate gateway device that serves as an intermediary between the outer loop and the inner loop. However, this is a somewhat inelegant solution that requires investment in additional devices, which will require ongoing maintenance and introduce yet another device into already large system networks. Across an entire site, this quickly becomes costly and complicates network topologies.

A better solution is an unconventional one. It is possible to set up a modern automation controller in such a way that it breaks the conventions of PLCs, as long as the device is capable of multi-core processing at pace. From Novotek’s perspective, one of the best modern units that meet this need is Emerson Automation’s CPL410 automation controller.

The CPL410 can split inner and outer loop processing between its multiple processor cores. The inner loop and PLC processes can run from a single core, while another core — or even a group of cores, depending on complexity — can run more sophisticated containerised applications or operating systems. Additional cores can broker between the inner and outer loops, ensuring reliability and security.

A multi-core setup is useful because it allows the PLC processes and gateway to be consolidating into a single unit, without compromising performance capacity or speed. It also means that ageing or obsolete PLCs can be upgraded to a controller such as the CPL410 during any modernisation initiatives, minimising additional capital costs.

Although the idea behind the IoT is not a new one for industrial businesses, the fact that other sectors are embracing the idea means more external data points than ever before are available. With systems in place that can support effective inner and outer loops, industrial businesses can leverage the increased connectivity of external markets and enhance their own operations.