Pace - Oct/Nov 2017

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 | VOL.70 NO.5 | Est. 1953

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OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 | VOL.70 NO.5 | Est. 1953

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INSIDE PACE

Energy Management

Motors and Drives

Internet of Things

How losing customers kept an energy company going

Improving efficiency and increasing safety with new crushers

Why cyber security is the next big issue for the IoT

SOLVING THE INSTRUMENTATION SPECIALIST SHORTAGE CRISIS EXCLUSIVE: All the winners from the 2017 Zenith Awards

CONTENTS

XXX

Managing Director: John Murphy Managing Editor: Syed Shah Editor: Mike Wheeler Ph: (02) 9439 7227 mike.wheeler@primecreative.com.au

IN THIS ISSUE

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24 Editor’s Comment 8 News 10

How a 20-year relationship helped turn a company around

State of Industry 12

Digitisation 28

Motors and Drives 14

Zenith Awards Winners 32

Why Australia is headed for an instrumentation specialist shortage and what can be done about it

PACE is owned by Prime Creative Media and published by John Murphy. All material in PACE is copyright and no part may be reproduced or copied in any form or by any means (graphic, electronic or mechanical including information and retrieval systems) without written permission of the publisher. The Editor welcomes contributions but reserves the right to accept or reject any material. While every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of information, Prime Creative Media will not accept responsibility for errors or omissions or for any consequences arising from reliance on information published.

The opinions expressed in PACE are not necessarily the opinions of, or endorsed by the publisher unless otherwise stated.

Overcoming installation challenges with a new set of crushers Energy Management 18

Horizon Power’s unusual view when deciding upon a new business direction

© Copyright Prime Creative Media, 2017 Articles All articles submitted for publication become the property of the publisher. The Editor reserves the right to adjust any article to conform with the magazine format.

Internet of Things 20

The next big thing in the IoT – cyber security

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Automation Software 25

Collaboration is a major plank when it comes to embracing digitisation All the 2017 Zenith Award winners announced Promotional Feature 42

Instrumentation

Promotional Feature 44

Automation and robotics New Products 48

All the latest new products from the process and control industry Wastewater 50

Improving flow measurement accuracy

ON THE COVER

Instrumentation shortage

Average Net Distribution Period ending Sept ’15 5,521

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 | VOL.70 NO.5 | Est. 1953

INSIDE PACE

Energy Management

Motors and Drives

Internet of Things

How losing customers kept an energy company going

Improving efficiency and increasing safety with new crushers

Why cyber security is the next big issue for the IoT

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SOLVING THE INSTRUMENTATION SPECIALIST SHORTAGE CRISIS EXCLUSIVE: All the winners from the 2017 Zenith Awards

4 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

A skills shortage in the instrumentation industry is looming. With a lack of investment by companies, and courses costing too much, not many students see instrumentation as a viable job opportunity.

Nothing could be further from the truth, according to experts who work in the field.

Specialists in this field will soon be in

demand and if there is no one graduating from TAFE then who will do the job?

Overseas candidates? That is one answer.

However, investing in the future is not a bad thing, something that companies should look into if they want to have a sustainable industry into the future.

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COMMENT

EDITOR’S MESSAGE

Mike Wheeler Editor

Why education matters

PERCEPTION can be a strange thing. What one person sees as a troublesome issue, another sees as an opportunity. Over the next 10 years Australia is going to have an instrumentation specialist shortage.

There are several reasons stated by experts within the industry – from TAFE increasing costs due to HECS,

industry having a nonchalant attitude, and state and federal governments both giving lip service to an industry that doesn’t garner a lot of votes.

However, it’s not all bad news.

Yet. Sure, the manufacturing and engineering sectors have taken hits over the past decade (who can compete with cheap labour in

8 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

emerging markets?), but there is still work that needs doing here.

And this is one of the key problems – perception. Yes, it is not a sexy industry. Yes, there is a gender imbalance. Yes, jobs are being shed in certain sectors. But, workers are still needed. There are plants to monitor, testing to be done, planned

maintenance to be finalised, the replacement of used parts – none of these issues can be fixed without trained technicians. And this is where opportunities arise.

This issue features an interesting conversation I had with instrumentation stalwart Bill Ebzery, senior lecturer in instrumentation at Sydney TAFE. He is adamant that there is a need for instrumentation specialists now and into the future.

The way Ebzery sees it, there is a worrying mentality within industry that states “it’s everybody else’s problem”. Then you run across somebody like Emmalee Hocking – also featured in this issue – who not only loves her job, but has a supportive workplace that encourages her to continue her education within this specialised industry. No lip service from her firm, just the realisation that personal growth benefits the company.

Then there is the emerging technologies in the energy sector that always garner interest mainly because, over the past couple of years, energy generation has been a hot topic.

We all know about solar and wind renewables that can be harnessed by SMEs, but what about wastewater being turned into biogas? While not economically viable at the moment, one company is working hard to make this a reality in the near future.

Finally, congratulations to all the winners at PACE’s annual Zenith Awards that were held in Sydney on August 15. It was a great night with a variety of innovative ideas, projects and products on display. It was also noted that these events come around very quickly, so if you have a project on the go that you think deserves a nomination, or a product that is cutting edge, drop me a line and I’ll make sure you get a nomination form for the 2018 awards. PACE

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NEWS

ANCA Motion opens branch in China

ANCA founder Pat Boland and Tianjin Association of High and New Technologies Zhigang Liu at the opening of the new branch.

A

NCA Motion has held its grand opening and ribbon cutting ceremony for its new branch in Tianjin, China.

Located at No. 102, Building F1, XEDA Emerging Industrial Park, Xiqing Economic-technological Development Area, Tianjin, P.R.China, the new branch is a significant step forward in ANCA Motion’s commitment to the Chinese market.

The new state-of-the-art Tianjin branch is 273m2 and capable of housing 12 staff, covering areas of applications development and support, training, sales and logistics.

“ANCA Motion is looking forward to building a future here in Tianjin with expansion in the years to come,”

said Grant Anderson, CEO of the ANCA Group.

“Our staff in Tianjin are an experienced and highly capable team offering the Chinese market specialists in application development, Industry 4.0, IoT, EtherCAT and mechatronic systems. We are excited about what we have to offer and the potential relationships that will be made here in China.”

ANCA was founded in 1974 by Pat Boland and Pat McClusky with an original focus on CNC control systems in Australia. They found themselves in the niche application market of tool and cutter grinding which then became the core of business for the next three decades. Through the success of their application in 2004

10 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

“ANCA Motion is looking forward to building a future here in Tianjin with expansion in the years to come” they incorporated an office in Shanghai to provide sales and support for their tool and cutter grinding machines.

This success led to the formation of ANCA Motion in 2008, to specialise in CNC control systems for the global automation markets, including specalised machining. ANCA Motion’s strength is its advanced CNC controls, which deliver high precision and performance in applications such as five-axis machining and highspeed laser cutting, which has been developed over decades.

The company designs and manufactures flexible control systems, specialising in high-precision solutions for CNC machines. They tailor their hardware and software to a OEMs exacting requirements, providing solutions that give their customers a competitive edge. ANCA Motion’s continuous support and innovation throughout the life of their products, allows them to deliver worldclass products and services to the global market. PACE

NEWS

University of Sydney charges ahead on zinc-air batteries

U

niversity of Sydney researchers have found a solution to one of the biggest stumbling blocks preventing zinc-air batteries from overtaking conventional lithium-ion batteries as the power source of choice in electronic devices.

Zinc-air batteries are powered by zinc metal and oxygen from the air. Due to the global abundance of zinc metal, they are much cheaper to produce than lithium-ion batteries.

While zinc-air batteries are currently used as an energy source in hearing aids and some film cameras and railway signal devices, their widespread use has been hindered by the fact that, up until now, recharging them has proved difficult. This is due to the lack of electrocatalysts that successfully

reduce and generate oxygen during the discharging and charging of a battery.

Published in Advanced Materials, a paper authored by chemical engineering researchers from the University of Sydney and Nanyang Technological University outlines a new three-stage method to overcome this problem.

Lead author Professor Yuan Chen, from the University of Sydney’s Faculty of Engineering and Information Technologies, said the new method can be used to create bifunctional oxygen electrocatalysts for building rechargeable zinc-air batteries from scratch.

“Until now, rechargeable zinc-air batteries have been made with expensive precious metal catalysts, such as platinum and iridium oxide. Our way produces a family of high-performance and low-cost catalysts,” he said.

Zinc-air batteries are batteries powered by zinc metal and oxygen from the air. Credit: University of Sydney.

These new catalysts are produced through the simultaneous control of the: 1) composition, 2) size and 3) crystallinity of metal oxides of earthabundant elements such as iron, cobalt and nickel. They can then be applied to build rechargeable zinc-air batteries.

Paper co-author, Dr Li Wei, said trials of the batteries developed with

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the new catalysts had demonstrated good rechargeability – including less than a 10 per cent battery efficacy drop over 60 discharging/charging cycles of 120 hours.

“We are solving fundamental technological challenges to realise more sustainable metal-air batteries for our society,” Chen added. PACE

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OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 www.pacetoday.com.au 11

STATE OF INDUSTRY

Where have all the instrumentation specialists gone?

The instrumentation and control industry could soon be in crisis unless the lack of graduates and apprentices is addressed. Mike Wheeler talks to two stakeholders on why the industry has got to this stage and how the issue can be fixed.

I

nstrumentation has never been a sexy industry. Peter Veron and Bill Ebzery know this. However, it always used to be an industry that attracted a fair chunk of people – mainly males – to its fold. Today, trying to get people to take a course, or businesses to support apprenticeships, is becoming harder.

Veron is the chairman of the Institute of Instrumentation Control and Automation Australia’s (IICA) NSW Branch, while Ebzery is the senior lecturer for instrumentation and control at Sydney TAFE. Both have been around the industry for a long time, and they both know the knowledge needed to enter the industry. They have also seen worrying changes, especially since the Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) was introduced.

Anybody who has studied the Australian manufacturing and process and control industries of late would think that the country’s best days in these arenas are behind it. But that’s a pessimist’s outlook. While there’s no denying cheaper labour pools in overseas countries are a beacon for locally based manufacturers wanting to cut costs, there are still plenty of domestic businesses that need instrumentation specialists. Mining is one area. There are also the petrochemical, pharmaceutical and a range of other industries that need graduates. Also, existing plant still needs to be maintained. Finally, there is the growing renewable energy and robotics/ AI sectors, which will need a whole raft of instrumentation and control specialists.

Who are the next generation of these specialists and where will they come from? A good question, said Ebzery. His instrumentation course currently has five first-year apprentices. Nowhere near enough.

“We’ve got seven in the second year,

and eight in third year,” said Ebzery.

“We used to have 36 going through, now we have less than 20. And that is going to drop off more unless we get industry involved.”

Up until 15-20 years ago, the apprenticeships would attract thousands of applicants and companies could cherry pick the best people for the job.

“It used to work like this,” said Ebzery. “If ICI needed 30 apprentices they would get 6000 applications for those 30 jobs. We’d head out to the Maroubra Town Hall and knock them down to 300 in one go. We’d give them a second go the following week and then we’d have our 30. Today, it’s more or less somebody’s mother’s uncle’s son who knows someone who gets an apprentice and they send them to us.”

Ebzery isn’t critical of the students he’s got. They’re mostly all very good, but there just aren’t enough of them.

Veron believes one problem is that some of the decision makers don’t appreciate the different requirements between various courses, or don’t appreciate that one course can’t necessarily be merged together with another.

“People aren’t enrolling in the instrumentation course,” he said.

“They’re doing an extra year tacked on to the electrical course. An understanding of instrumentation and control is different to the requirements of an electrician – it’s a different discipline altogether.

“There is still a need for instrumentation people on the ground in Australia because there’s always a need to fine tune or replace and repair plant equipment as well as regular maintenance to increase efficiencies.

And if people don’t understand how a piece of equipment works in the first place, they’re not going to be able to maintain it properly.”

HECS also has a lot to answer for,

12 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

Lack of practical experience is an issue for those coming into the industry from overseas, says IICA NSW chairman Peter Veron.

said Ebzery. What used to be a $1,200$1,500 course now costs anywhere up to $13,000. Ebzery concedes that the previous iteration was heavily subsidised, but now even somebody who has an interest in the industry – and may not even be an apprentice but is keen to do the course off their own volition – cannot afford to do the course. And Ebzery doesn’t even want to talk about the loss of interest some companies have putting people through now that the course costs almost 10 times what it once did.

“If you’ve got to pay $13,000 over two years to do this course, and you’re not in the position to earn that money to start with, no wonder the number of people wanting to do the instrumentation course has collapsed,” said Ebzery.

Now the problem is known, what can be done about it? According to Veron, bringing in overseas’ graduates is not the answer.

“You get a lot of people coming here with degrees from overseas,” he said.

“However, one thing they all have in common is lack of practical experience.

They might come here with several pieces of paper like MBAs and Masters.

Yet, practically they don’t know what they’re looking at when they’re faced with an instrument or don’t know how to configure and optimise a process.”

Veron is disappointed that the government doesn’t appear to be looking after local manufacturing and workers as best it could. Over the last 10 years we have seen a massive decline in local manufacturing, from the clothing sector right up to the local automotive manufacturers.

“I think the government needs to look at the global picture, not just a three-year plan they all seem to have,” said Veron. “We need a long-term plan.

I know everybody is anti-Trump but the one thing I do like is that he is trying to manufacture locally and employ more local people, effectively creating local opportunities” Ebzery doesn’t like being a pessimist.

He comes across as passionate and

STATE OF INDUSTRY

Up until about 15 years ago, the industry could pick the cream of the crop for apprenticeships in the instrumentation sector. enthusiastic about his chosen profession, but he and the IICA can’t do it on their own.

“The only way I can see for things to get better is to get people talking about it,” he said. “There is a big

blank. People are not prepared to put themselves out. Peter and I think that this is a bigger problem than just a lack of apprentices.

“We’re going to run out of smart people to do the job. It’s a real problem.

EMMALEE’S STORY Getting enough instrumentation specialists is a huge issue for Australia in the coming decade (see main story), and there are very few women involved in the industry. There is a grand total of 20 first, second and third-year apprentices going through the Instrumentation and Control Course at Sydney TAFE, with the only woman being second-year apprentice Emmalee Hocking.

Hocking excelled in her course not only because she is very good at what she does but also due to her upbringing.

“My grandfather was an engineering draftsman/handyman extraordinaire, and he definitely passed on his patience and passion for craftsmanship to me when I was young,” said Hocking. “He was the first person to teach me maths, creative problem solving, and practical things like photography and woodwork.”

It seems like the trait is genetic as both her brother and sister also work in the technical field. Currently, Hocking works for Cermak Peterka Petersen (CPP) a US-based company that, among other things, specialises in testing the effects of wind on buildings and cladding.

“I am a wind tunnel technician. It’s a combination of structural and environmental engineering,” said Hocking. “We use 3D models of buildings and construct the surrounding environment to scale. We then put it in a wind tunnel and blow wind on it and do a whole range of testing.”

Being a self-motivated person, Hocking decided she needed to upskill and was looking online at possible courses and came across the Instrumentation Course being run at Sydney TAFE by Bill Ebzery.

“I started looking up relevant courses that might help me understand a bit more what I was doing and I found this,” said Hocking. “It was so incredibly relevant to what I needed and what I wanted to do. I didn’t even know instrumentation was a whole industry. I looked for the course because I just wanted to be better at my job. The company was super keen for me to do the course. They needed a specialist in this field.”

Does she think that the course is even necessary? Couldn’t a lot of what she

As teachers of the trade we know how long it takes. Some people talk about private institutes - even putting together a 10-week certificate program. You can’t learn about instrumentation in ten weeks. It takes two years.”

Like any profession, the length of time it takes to learn a trade is just one aspect that needs considering. Changes within the industry are also an issue.

“The biggest role change is that instrumentation specialists need to know how to run diagnostics,” said Ebzery. “They need to know what the instrument is telling them. Also, microprocessors are being made so much better. At one time we were looking at parts per million, now its parts per billion. You need the smarts to tell you what is happening.

Ebzery believes that if the coming shortage is addressed, it is a win-win-win situation for the person being trained, employers and Australia.

“If you want to cook a frog you have to start slow,” said Ebzery.

“Hitting people with a $13,000 bill up front is not the way. I could sell it for about $6,000 if we get industry on board. If you’re a young person coming into the industry having spent $13,000 there is no clear cut place you can go. You can’t go to Shell or Caltex or any of the other big companies so you’re stuck. But people want them. They want them in the mines, they want them in the north west shelf. But it’s very difficult.

“How much is it going to cost?

At the end of the day he or she earns money. They pay taxes. In real terms, training the next generation of apprentices is the best national asset you can have. It might cost us $6,000 or $8,000 for an apprentice but that could literally be paid back in the first five years of employment. A trade is very valuable for the country. But if the companies don’t talk about it, and the politicians don’t talk about it, then our children and grandchildren will have nothing.” PACE

Hocking needed to upskill and came across the Instrumentation course being run at Sydney TAFE.

does be learned onsite instead of in the classroom?

“I appreciate the course more as an apprentice,” she said. “At a TAFE day something will click more because I’ve done something similar at work.

On a work day something might click more because I heard it at TAFE. The teaching is really good, but my favourite part is knowing the lecturers absolutely know their stuff. They have decades of experience. I love hearing stories about their time in industry. I have absolute confidence in their ability to pass on their knowledge.”

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 www.pacetoday.com.au 13

MOTORS AND DRIVES

Next generation crushing technology boosts efficiency When Boral’s Linwood quarry’s crushers were due for an upgrade, there were a large number of considerations that needed taking into account. Not least, the new configuration of the crusher’s motors. PACE explains.

L

ocated in the Adelaide suburb of Seacliff Park, Boral’s Linwood quarry is positioned within one of South Australia’s most important sources of hard rock.

Quarrying started over 130 years ago, when the quarry was first operated in 1882. Boral, Australia’s largest building and construction materials supplier, acquired the quarry in 1994. Today, Linwood’s operations are focused on providing high-quality aggregate, critical in the production of composite materials such as concrete and asphalt.

In recent years, Adelaide has seen an increase of large construction projects such as its desalination plant, the city’s Northern and Southern Expressways and the Royal Adelaide Hospital. As a consequence of these projects, the demand for aggregate

products has progressively increased, challenging the quarry’s production capabilities. In 2013, site management identified the need to upgrade their crushing and screening plant with the latest technology to meet this growing demand.

The requirement for new equipment first became evident in the quarry’s primary crushing section.

The plant’s 30-year-old primary jaw crusher was struggling to keep up with production demands. The machine’s reliability and downtime were affecting overall plant performance, maintenance costs had risen sharply, and the availability of spares had become an ongoing problem. Linwood’s management decided that investing in a new machine was their best option. Following a detailed analysis

The larger motors required new mounting and cabling arrangements from the crushers through to the switch room.

14 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

of the quarry’s requirements, the team selected Metso’s C140 jaw crusher.

“Minimising the need to modify our existing civils was a key prerequisite for the new machine,” said quarry manager Andy Baker.

“Essentially we needed a modern likefor-like crusher that would fit into the existing footprint, increase throughput and be easy to maintain – Metso’s C140 met all these criteria,” he said.

While improving throughput and reliability was a priority, Linwood’s management also recognised the upgrade as an opportunity to improve site safety. As part of the crusher installation, new walkways and access platforms were designed to improve access to the quarry’s primary crushing station.

Once the C140 was installed,

the crusher’s performance and reliability improved product quality and throughput. The new machine’s ability to deliver more consistent output also reduced the load and wear rates in other key areas of the plant.

Where personnel previously needed to constantly monitor the crusher to ensure a consistent product output size, this was now an automated process. “Now we can simply program the gap setting and be confident about what product we are going to get,” said Baker. “The C140’s hydraulic adjustment provides a massive advantage for us in terms of overall efficiency and safety. It eliminates manual adjustments and associated hazards. This saves us time and keeps production rates up.”

The plant’s primary crusher

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The HP3’s touch screen simplified the adjustment of the crusher parameters. upgrade represented a big change for quarry staff, as it brought the latest technology to the primary crushing process in the form of advanced automation and safety. Metso’s area manager, Andy Gough, said that postcommissioning support was important to ensure a smooth transition period.

“The new machine offered many benefits, however it was a significant change for the site. We worked hard to maintain a presence at the quarry post commissioning, offering a comprehensive range of support services during this critical period,” he said

A win in tertiary crushing quality and efficiency

Shortly after the new crusher was installed in 2014, its increased production capacity shifted the site’s bottleneck to the tertiary crushing circuit. Tertiary crushing involves further reducing aggregate in size while shaping it into final end products.

While it’s important to keep up with upstream feed rates, high precision is required to ensure the right product shape. Linwood had two cone crushers responsible for this task that were nearing the end of their effective service life.

By weight and volume, cubically shaped aggregate is characteristically much stronger than flatter, elongated material. A problem with the existing crushers was their inability to reliably

produce aggregate that met the required index of elongation and flakiness. To get the right shape, operators had to recirculate the output product through the crushers, and/ or channel it for additional screening and polishing. Recirculation required additional processing time, which could have been utilised producing new feed material.

Another method employed by the quarry’s team to improve shape was to set the crushers with tighter closed-side settings. This increased downstream plant load that caused screens and conveyors to use more energy or become overloaded. Running the crushers longer also increased machine wear, energy consumption and reduced production rates. With output quality so dependent on operator intervention, another problem was the risk of end-product stock piles being contaminated with inferior product.

These inefficiencies meant there was less yield per unit of feed.

Site management considered replacing their tertiary cone crushers with units from Boral’s extensive install base. Eventually, the team decided that the installation of two new machines would provide the best solution. In 2015 Metso was awarded with a contract to supply two HP3 cone crushers.

When Linwood first compared Metso HP3’s specifications with their existing crushers, it was a challenge

16 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

to reconcile their performance and operating requirements. One of the first things that the team noticed was how different the crusher’s size, power and capacity were. The HP3’s design was physically smaller than the old crushers, yet Metso said that the machines had a 20 per cent higher throughput capacity and could produce a higher precision product with one-pass production.

According to Peter Small, Metso’s capital sales manager, there were a number of factors that allowed the HP3 to outperform similarsized machines. He said that while automation with integrated control was an important factor, it was the efficiency of the crushing process that made the biggest difference.

“The HP3’s efficiency is derived from a design that increases the concentration of aggregate inside the crusher,” said Small. “It applies more crushing force and relies on a greater degree of inter-particle crushing.

Getting these elements to work relies on complex calculations and detailed analysis of process variables, feed material characteristics and final product specification.”

Small said that an essential part of Metso’s crushing solution was Bruno, the company’s crushing and screening simulation software tool. Bruno calculated and tested process models based on empirical crushing and screening expertise.

When Linwood needed to select its new crushers, the HP3 had just been released. There weren’t any of these machines operating in Australia, which meant Linwood’s decision makers couldn’t call upon the experiences of their usual references within Boral or the broader quarrying community.

The availability of spares for the first and only units in Australia was also a concern.

The company recognised that the next generation HP3 offered many benefits. The technology would future-proof the site’s tertiary circuit and enable the wider integration of automation across the entire plant.

Baker said that Metso’s local and global support network was a factor in Linwood’s decision making process.

“The support we received helped us to fully explore and understand the options and benefits the HP3s could offer, specific to our situation. For me, a key differentiating factor was the integrated control and automated operation of the HP3s - we knew this was the single biggest technology step towards improving our product quality and efficiency.”

Overcoming installation challenges

Replacing the old crushers with the new HP3s was always going to be a challenge while maintaining aggregate production rates at the quarry. From an electrical point of view, the HP3’s larger motor required new mounting and cabling arrangements from the crusher through to the switch room. The mechanical work included installing new cooling units and a bigger standalone lubrication system. A redesign of the feeder to a new location was also required. Alongside this work were the site’s safety improvements, which included extended platforms and improved working areas. The team estimated that the electrical and mechanical upgrades would take the tertiary crushing station offline for at least 17 days.

This made the timing of the installation a critical consideration.

Linwood’s management originally considered performing the installation over Christmas, but were concerned about the availability of personnel, parts, and materials during this period.

Although management had planned

MOTORS AND DRIVES

to stockpile product in preparation for the installation, at the same time they had major projects to supply and knew their reserves wouldn’t last 17 days. In order to help mitigate the loss of production, a trailer-mounted cone crusher and screen was refurbished to supplement supply while the main plant was offline.

A leap forward in site productivity and safety

SMC Australia | New Zealand

During the selection process, a high degree of automation was a requirement for the site. Once the new HP3s had been installed, feedback from the quarry’s operators has been particularly centred on this aspect.

The HP3’s touch-screen interface allows operators to have quick and easy access to troubleshooting, throughput and motor current information.

Mechanical settings, which previously had to be manually adjusted, were now performed in seconds via the machine’s touch screen.

Stray metallic objects, called tramp iron, that enter the crusher could stall and even damage the machine.

The HP3’s tramp release system with dual-acting hydraulic cylinders and fixed return point allowed the crusher to eject tramp iron. If the crusher stopped under load, the dual-acting hydraulic cylinders provided a stroke that cleared the crushing cavity. In both instances the crusher’s settings were instantly restored without the need for operator intervention.

The HP3’s liner fastening system didn’t require the backing material that was common with other crushers. When liners were changed or reconfigured, hydraulic motors rotated the bowl completely out of the adjustment ring threads. These two innovations saved a lot of time and labour.

Technology upgrade – making the big difference

The upgrades to Linwood’s crushing circuit have improved the

site’s production capabilities and modernised its crushing process.

Commenting on these outcomes, Baker believes the site is now capable of producing more, while maintaining high product quality and improving safety. “The throughput we are getting has surpassed

our expectations. Our ongoing maintenance costs have come down, while the automation and access platform upgrades have improved plant safety. Overall, we can now more reliably meet market demands for our key-specification products,” he said. PACE

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OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 www.pacetoday.com.au 17

ENERGY MANAGEMENT

Why embracing disruption is a good thing Horizon Power tried an unusual approach to power generation, which ended up saving the Western Australian tax payer more than $100 million. Mike Wheeler explains.

F

our years ago West Australiabased power utility Horizon Power saw that the electricity industry was in a state of flux and decided it wanted to be at the leading edge even it meant being a little unconventional “Our plan included customers generating their own energy,” said Horizon Power’s Mike Houlahan. “We wanted customers to use storage with their own batteries.”

Consumers generating their own energy and using storage batteries doesn’t seem like a great plan for how an energy company can grow its business. However, Horizon Power is a state-owned enterprise with a customer base of 48,000 covering 2.4 million square kilometres. It is a heavily subsidised operation due to the amount of ground it has to cover and the remote location of many of the customers it serves. The company’s general manager, commercial services and finance, Mike Houlahan, spoke at the 2017 ABB Digital Transformation Summit and outlined why the company needed to change the way it did business and how it needed to embrace the coming changes – even if affected revenue.

“As consumers generate more, we lose revenue,” said Houlahan. “Most organisations would go ‘Hang on, let’s push this back as far as we can because we can’t let this happen.’ We didn’t do that because we thought if we can’t provide what the customers want then somebody else will. We had to find a revenue and business model that would enable us to meet our customer’s needs and stay in business and we had to embrace that disruption head on.

“When we started our transformation journey, most employees in the organisation would have said a couple of things – we are an asset management business and a monopoly that happens to sell electricity. We don’t

think like that anymore.”

Currently, the electricity market is very fractured. From the way it generates energy, such as coal fired, solar and wind; to how it is distributed – retailers, wholesalers, or giving consumers access to wholesale prices such as Victoria-based Flow Power is doing; through to the recent trends such as self-generation and storage batteries.

A main reason people are looking to help themselves is that energy prices are increasing. According to a June report in Western Australia’s Perth Now newspaper the state’s average electricity bill went up by almost 11 per cent this year, while the national average pay increase was three per cent. The coal-fired people blame renewables, renewables people blame the coal-fired aficionados, and so it goes on.

Houlahan believes it doesn’t have to be like this if companies start looking at their customer base as those driving the changes and start being smarter especially with the disruptors coming into play – the aforementioned solar and wind power and storage batteries. And for those who hate change, Houlahan points out that the past 10-15 years have seen many disruptions in various industries that have turned the way we do things on its head.

“There’s Uber, which is a taxi company with no taxis,” he said.

“Facebook is the world’s largest media company with no content. Ali Baba – one of the biggest retailers – has no inventory. These are the business models we have to learn from. We have to go down the road of new technology and innovation. And what drives these disruptors are customer expectations.

In all these cases, traditional service providers didn’t listen to the customer and their expectations. So somebody else came and enabled the technology.

When you transform, you are transforming your core business, you

18 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

Microgrids are a great solution for energy needs in remote communities. have to stabilise that core.”

Horizon employed the Boston Consulting Group who said that it needed a two-pronged approach – cost reduction and driving innovation to increase business.

“We had to make sure that if we were going to drive changes that they were consistent. It was not a shortcut exercise,” said Houlahan. “We benchmarked against US co-op utilities.

They are lean. There are a lot of them and they operate very well. After all the numbers were crunched we found we could reduce our subsidy by $100 million per annum. Our revenue is about $500 million a year and our costs are about $450 million per year.

“The key was that we developed 163 road maps to deliver the outcomes necessary to make the savings. The consultants left so we had to deliver.

And that is usually where it falls apart.

But for us, it was really simple. We believed that the result was possible.”

The roadmaps showed Horizon that the $100 million in subsidy reduction was achievable, they just had to work out how to do it. This was achieved in January this year with a $102 million subsidy reduction banked in the state budget. The company projects that

it will achieve a cumulative subsidy reduction of $638 million by 2021.

Being state owned, Horizon Power’s stakeholders aren’t shareholders (other than the Western Australian government) but the state tax payer. It was up to them to make the savings, which included embracing digitisation.

“A digital transformation is about the customer and about optimising our employees,” said Houlahan. “So we put our platforms in place including cloud-based platforms, in Horizon Power’s case, Microsoft Azure. We are now looking at mobile applications and are launching an app that will tell customers in near real time how much they owe. It will forecast their bill and tell them their consumption. This is a data-driven app.”

Houlahan cites the example of the remote Pilbara town of Onslow in Western Australia to demonstrate how Horizon’s new approach worked.

Onslow is home to Australia’s largest distributed energy resource (DER) microgrid. Situated on the northwest coast of the state, Onslow is a remote township of approximately 600 households that is about to go through a substantial population growth due to an off-shore gas operation. Horizon Power

ENERGY MANAGEMENT

XT TION E N RA E EN

G

Horizon Power’s Mike Houlahan believes that the company’s new approach to embracing disruption is a win-win situation for Horizon and its customers.

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had to make sure the town’s electricity supply not only met upcoming demands but was optimised in favour of the customer, not the power company. The brief also called for 50 per cent of the town’s energy needs to be met via renewables due to its isolated location.

“We are undergrounding the network to start off,” said Houlahan. “We will have 50 percent photovoltaic and 50 percent DER. We will also have gas generation and battery storage. ABB has their switchboard and inverters right in the centre of it all. What we will have effectively done once we have finished is bring the year 2050 to the year 2019. In other words, a de-centralised power station. We see this as a test case so we know how to roll it out to the other remote communities.”

Houlahan added that another issue with remote communities is managing peak demand. Unlike the perception of being on a national grid, there is no neverending power supply. With the exception of cutting off the consumer as was the case in South Australia in 2016, the easiest way to curb peak power is to offer a variety of incentives.

“We carried out an incentivised pilot scheme using 407 customers including more than 60 businesses in Port Hedland in the Pilbara” said Houlahan. “We gave them a strict target of a 20 per cent reduction during peak demand and we gave them four chances. If they went over their peak power allotment, they’d lose an incentive. Ninety-seven per cent of participants got incentives, which means they changed their behaviours.”

That proved to Horizon Power that customers understood the consequences of their power usage. It also showed the positive outcome for those who consume a lot of energy but were prepared to change their behaviour to reduce their demand for power during the peak period, 1pm to 8pm.

And the future? Houlahan is bullish about where the company is heading. Once these roadmaps have been signed off, new ones will be created and it’s all about keeping up the momentum.

“Looking to the future we can look at sophisticated predictive load forecasting – which is all very exciting,” said Houlahan. “Then there is augmented reality in terms of training and network controls. We’ve got an innovation division and predictive analysis teams. You have to embrace this disruption and the future because then you get the opportunity to lead the customer expectation.

“We’ll have new payment channels. I’m expecting that in the near future a customer will get an SMS saying ‘Do you want to pay part of this bill?’ and they’ll say ‘yeah fine’. It’s done.

“We are working out what the customer wants and are providing, or aiming to provide, those services. Some traditional revenue streams will decline with customers seeking other products from us, while we continue to find other opportunities and customer needs to replace that. We’re innovating and that’s how we’re getting ahead,” said Houlahan. PACE

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INTERNET OF THINGS

Complacency biggest challenge against cyber attacks Having connected devices in the work place is a good thing, but security is an issue that needs addressing.

Mike Wheeler talks to security experts about how companies can protect themselves.

I

t’s been a hard slog, but everything’s gone to plan.

Your plant is up and running.

Automated systems are humming along nicely. The hardware and software are configured, spewing out data left, right and centre. Orders are coming in. Client fulfilments are being met. They’re happy. You’re happy.

Then bang. Everything grinds to a halt.

Conveyor belts stop, goods are backed up on production lines and the loading bay lies empty.

This is the real threat for companies who have embraced the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) in their automated processes. The IIoT brings many great things to the table. It gets devices talking – sharing information, sending and receiving

data, allows actuators and sensors to compare notes – a plethora of functions designed to make modern plants functional and streamlined.

However, modernising manufacturing plant to include the IIoT also means it will become vulnerable to cyber-attacks. The two biggest ransomware attacks to date in 2017 – WannaCry and NotPetya – crippled businesses around the world including oil companies, financial institutions and Cadbury’s chocolate factory in Hobart.

Peter Clissold, who is a senior cyber security consultant for Schneider Electric, brings some sobering figures to the table when it comes to the WannaCry incident – not so much how much the

With literally billions of devices being connected to the Internet, security is more important than ever in the process and control industry.

20 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

criminals made, but what it costs in terms of damages.

“One of the last set of figures I saw show the criminals made $144,000,” said Clissold. “However, there was between $200 million to $20 billion worth of damage, lost opportunity and remediation across the globe.”

According to David Higgins, who is the regional director of data security specialist WatchGuard Technologies, people who are developing devices for the IIoT sometimes forget about the security aspect.

“It used to be things like phones and laptops that needed security, now it’s IIoT devices in manufacturing, mining and various other sectors,” said Higgins. “We collate information from firewalls our customers have protecting their devices; this information shows there are network scams for vulnerable firewalls and IIoT devices. Anything that has got an open SSH (Secure Shell) or Telnet access is vulnerable.”

Telnet and SSH give people the ability to access devices remotely.

It never used to be this hard. Back in the days of paperwork, security was less of an issue as a criminal would have to physically go out of their way to get information from an organisation.

“I’m a geologist by training and back before computers the data we recorded was handwritten,” said Higgins. “We kept the information secret because I worked for a public company and that information could be of value in terms of stock price. Today, that sort of information may have value for somebody who is looking to buy your company or resources from you.”

Movement of data and who has access are also issues that need addressing, according to Clissold.

“Where the IIoT starts to have some challenges is that, as we build security

up onto those industrial facilities, people can move data from one site to another, which could be from a secure zone to a less secure zone,” said Clissold. “You need to put controls around what people can and can’t do in those areas. This is not just from an information perspective but from an availability and integrity perspective.

When we start to open up access to the data in these devices we are increasing the potential attacks that may happen within these facilities.”

Lackadaisical attitudes are also a problem. Higgins believes people want convenience over security. And when you have literally billions of devices being connected to the Internet, security is more important than ever.

Especially in environments such as the process and control industry. With automation and robotics starting to take on a bigger role, there are more opportunities than ever for people with bad intentions to gain access to connected HMIs, software-run processing lines and other plant.

“If it’s a tradeoff between security and convenience I think convenience is going to win out every time with the consumer,” said Higgins. “Take the case of people thinking they are secure because they use a fingerprint to open their smartphone. But we have to remember that there is also a password sitting in the background that I can access as well.”

Clissold backs this assertion up.

However, in the past year he has noticed a change in attitude.

“There’s still a complacency around ‘it’s not going to happen to me’,” said Clissold. “When you dig deeper about what they are focusing on with regard to cyber security, you look at what they are doing with operational facilities, it’s either ‘oh, that’s somebody else’s

INTERNET OF THINGS

problem’ or ‘we’re going to get to that in the next round of activities’. Twelve months ago, it was in the too hard basket but now people are starting to make some significant changes.”

Higgins main concern isn’t for the big players in the market, but the smallto medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

“The people in enterprises have always taken it seriously,” he said.

“Generically speaking – up to now – SMEs have gone with a bit of a ‘she’ll be alright’ attitude. That is changing.

The potential downside of what will happen if you are breached – beyond ransomware – to where you are attacked and you are leaking all your data out – such as product information or your IP – is becoming more serious. However, I’m not sure that the people using IIoT devices recognise that all their devices need to be protected. If the information you have on your devices is of value to you, it’s of value to cybercrims, too.”

Higgins has some simple steps to ensure that devices are protected. They are tried and true, and bordering on common sense, but people still don’t

take some of these precautions.

He recommends that all IIoT devices are put behind a firewall. It is also important the firewall can block remote access connections such as Telnet and SSH. An old adage, but one that needs repeating year after year, is don’t use standard user names and passwords like ‘admin’ and ‘username’.

Also, make sure you update any patches. “Just like a patch on a phone or PC, it is important you implement the vendor updates that are patching any vulnerabilities that are found,” said Higgins.

Clissold believes organisations have to look into, and invest in, a cyber security management system and to make sure they understand what sort of security framework they want to apply within their environment.

“They need to look at the differences between information technology and operational technology security,” said Clissold. “Instead of having two separate frameworks running, work a bit harder to make sure the one framework is applicable

to both parts of the business.”

Higgins also points out there are a couple of issues on the horizon that need addressing by those using IIoT devices.

“An interesting trend from our point of view is that we are using Artificial Intelligence and machine intelligence to provide better security,” said Higgins.

“So, as we get all these massive attacks of malware, we can start to use IIoT and AI to understand where the malware practitioners are going and get in front of them. The problem is you have to assume the malware guys are going to be using the same technology.”

And companies who have turnovers of more than $3 million have to realise that new legislation coming into effect in early 2018 means that companies and individuals can be liable for massive fines if they don’t protect their internetenabled infrastructure.

“Anybody who has a data breach has to identify the information being lost and has to publicly disclose the fact,” said Higgins. “They have to disclose it to the privacy commissioner

and that they have been hacked.

“There are a couple of real kickers in the legislation. If you share the information you have with another organisation and that other organisation gets breached, you can still be held accountable.”

There are significant fines – up to $350,000 for the individual and $1 million for companies. However, it is the mandatory disclosure and brand damage that will hurt the image of the company.

Higgins doesn’t believe the government is using the fines as a revenue-collecting exercise.

“It’s not trying to frighten people,” said Higgins. “I think it is the government trying to say, ‘look, as businesses move more and more online, as we move to a fully digital economy, everybody is going to be responsible for ensuring the data they’re collecting is secured’. I think it’s more about awareness. And remember this — the malware guys will be using better and newer techniques to deploy more vicious and malicious attacks.” PACE

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 www.pacetoday.com.au 21

RENEWABLE ENERGY

Turning Australia on to natural power The push to reduce industrial carbon emissions in Australia has led to more renewable energy projects on the ground including solar, wind and biogas. Steven Impey looks at what’s the best foot forward.

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urning energy into money is the business many manufacturers are in. They may not look at it in that light – however, turning fuel into product at the best rate of return is essentially what the industry thrives on.

Rising gas prices are impacting the future for many of these processing plants so finding an alternative energy source that can keep both production moving and costs down would be like striking oil for the first time.

For an economy like Australia’s – driven exponentially by the export of its mining and gas commodities – there is an ongoing conflict between the amount of energy the country uses versus its environmental policy, and how that serves the supply chain.

The rise of renewables is seeing more energy sought by cleaner means; including the better-known solar and wind projects and also the lesserused methods of turning organically occurring wastewater into methane, which scientists have recognised as an area of opportunity.

At CST Wastewater Solutions, director Mike Bambridge is seeking ways to make the process of converting wastewater into energy attractive across more small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Australia, although admits there is some distance to go before energy use of this kind is economically viable on a national scale.

“Most of the technologies are proven and one of the things that we don’t particularly like to do is reinvent the

Companies are seeking ways to make the process of converting wastewater into energy attractive across more SMEs.

22 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

wheel,” Bambridge told PACE. “The Europeans have had biogas projects for a long time. However, what is often missing is the engineering to apply those processes for industry use in Australia and that is where we come in.”

In simple terms, engineering biogas into the processing plant depends – like any natural resource – on how well energy is packaged to assist productivity.

“It’s about putting something that is always naturally occurring in an environment where it can proliferate and can add engineering solutions for the particular factory you are working,” Bambridge explained.

“For a food factory, for example, the first step is always to look at your housekeeping because wastewater is normally a loss of product through inefficiencies or simple clean-downs of production vessels.

“The first question is whether the factory has the latest technology within its walls, because the truth is this: for the last 30 years, companies have just washed wastewater down the drain. It is often seen as someone else’s problem.”

What companies are coming to realise, according to Bambridge, is that wastewater is not only a loss of product, but also a loss of energy.

On the E&Y’s Renewable Energy Index, Australia is ranked in the top 10 countries in the world for renewable energy investment.

In addition, the Federal Government’s Renewable Energy Target is on track to source 23.5 per cent of Australia’s electricity from renewable sources by 2020.

According to the Department of Environment and Energy, the Emissions Reduction Fund is a $2.55 billion program providing a broad range of opportunities to reduce emissions and sequester carbon across the economy.

“The Australian Government recognises that supporting the

development, demonstration and deployment of clean energy technologies is necessary to transition the world’s energy sector to low emissions over the course of the century,” a department spokesperson said.

Investment in clean energy innovation is also available through projects such as the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) and the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA).

The CEFC uses debt and equity funding to promote investment in clean energy technologies while ARENA provides research-, developmentand deployment-grant funding to improve the affordability and supply of renewable energy in Australia.

Together, the two bodies manage the $200 million, government-funded Clean Energy Innovation Fund, to support early-stage and emerging clean energy technologies such as gas engines to generate electricity, or use heat to operate boilers and other combustion devices.

The so-called energy crisis stems largely from inflated prices of electricity and gas versus their availability to the consumer.

Another energy solution manufacturers are using is solar power, which is just as accessible, according to the industry, yet “far less understood”.

That is the view of Andrew Pintar, business development manager at Greenland Systems, who believes processing companies are not making the most of heat-based solutions, such as the role steam and boiling water can play in the plant.

“Advanced solar thermal technologies – such as Greenland Systems’ evacuated tubes (GLX100) – are well suited to industrial processes that require temperatures reaching as high as 200°C,” Pintar said.

“Coupled with thermal energy

RENEWABLE ENERGY

storage, solar thermal can be considered a viable alternative to replace significant portions of natural gas use in industry.

“The use of a high-temperature capability is the critical aspect.”

While investment is important, Pintar spoke about the role research and development within the company is also playing to improve both sustainability and price competitiveness in the search for a renewable energy solution in Australia’s processing industry.

“Solar power and solar thermal solutions for processing heat are already realities today,” he said. “It is a matter of industry to realise that there are options available to be more environmentally sustainable while significantly reducing their operating costs.

“Over time, it is totally achievable for large parts of industry to reduce their carbon emissions by at least 80 per cent. The only thing that will prevent it is management and political will.”

The government’s Emissions Reduction Fund is an alternative to the short-lived Australian carbon tax, which placed a price on units of carbon

dioxide a company would emit and was repealed in July 2014 – only two years after it came into action.

Although the scheme, which was part of the broader Clean Energy Futures Plan, didn’t last very long, Bambridge believes its success was giving those processing companies involved a different perspective.

“Indirectly, we are seeing gas prices going up and anyone who took up new processes during the ‘carbon tax’ period, they are reaping an extra benefit because the value of what they recovered is more valuable due to the price of gas,” he said.

“When the carbon tax was implemented, there was certainly an impetus to do something about recovering energy from your wastewater.

While Australian business leaders have to be forward-thinking, unfortunately, most companies want pay back within five years, whereas most environmental sustainability projects last five years or more.

“Therefore, you need something else to get it across the line and that’s where the government incentives can help.”

Persuading a country sitting on copious amounts of oil, gas and coal to turn to alternative sources of energy isn’t easy. Bambridge is hopeful that, with new trials and projects to up the ante, more companies will see the benefit of incorporating renewable energy in their factory.

The biggest step is to convince

managers that it can be done, which means converting the traditionalist into an innovator.

“There is a very bright future for renewable energy [in processing] if we manage to get the policies right.

That’s the only thing that is missing – there is not enough direction from the government,” said Bambridge. PACE

Wastewater from industry can be harnessed to provide part of the equation to Australia’s energy needs.

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MEGATRANS

Robotics: The future is already here Just how automated are industries? It varies, but some are becoming more automated that others. PACE explains.

A

t the recent Zenith Awards held in Sydney in August, keynote speaker Professor Salah Sukkarieh wowed the audience with descriptions of some of the automation technologies that are not only being developed but are already being put to work.

Sukkarieh, who is the director of research and innovation, Australian centre for field robotics at The University of Sydney, has led a number of robotics and intelligent systems research and development projects.

These have focussed on areas such as logistics, commercial aviation, aerospace, education, environment monitoring, agriculture and mining.

During his presentation, Sukkarieh’s slide show illustrated just how far some industries have come, especially in materials handling and agriculture.

A few years ago the Port of Brisbane started using Autostrads, which move containers around the port. Some ports were not sold on the technology, but two years ago, 50 Autostrads were brought into Sydney’s Port Botany.

Besides providing an automated

container system, the Autostrads only require one person to be in control of the container yard.

Weighing in at 65 tonnes, an Autostrad is capable of carrying 50-tonne loads. It comes with an in-built navigation system and pilot controller. It travels around the yard in sequences that, in some cases, are accurate to within millimetres.

A key to the navigation system is that it is made up of two independent parts that self-correct each other if one makes a mistake. One uses a millimetre wave radar sensor while the other utilises a real-time-kinematic global positioning sensor.

Safety is also a key consideration, and there are several pieces of technology onboard that make sure the yard is as safe as possible. As well as anti-collision technology, the unit will not operate unless it receives a “heartbeat” radio signal, which will shut off if anybody enters the enclosed yard where the Autostrads operate.

In the agriculture sector, Sukkarieh’s team is working on automated units that weed and water vegetables. These kinds of devices are

24 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

designed to look after the health of plants, and also increase possible yields.

These types of innovations and technologies are similar to what visitors will see at MEGATRANS2018.

MEGATRANS2018 – an exciting new international trade event – will bridge the gaps between these industry segments that have previously been operating in isolation.

The show makes its debut 10 to 12 May, 2018 at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, based in the heart of the one of Australia’s major logistics hubs and one of the world’s most liveable cities – Melbourne.

Connecting the Australian and international supply chain, the three-day expo, delivered in partnership with the Victorian Government, will bring together those who plan, implement and control the efficient and effective forward flow and storage of goods, services and related information between the point of origin and point of consumption.

A number of sections comprise the show’s 30,000 square metres of space – logistics and materials

handling/warehousing and storage; road transport, air, sea and rail; and infrastructure; with a strong emphasis on technology right throughout.

Other features of MEGATRANS2018 include the Global Shippers Forum, the Australian Road Transport Suppliers Association (ARTSA) Global Leaders’ Summit, the Logistics & Materials Handling Mercury Awards, a Ministerial Breakfast delivered in partnership with the Victorian Government and Transport Certification Australia’s (TCA) Technology Hub. The Port of Melbourne is a supporting sponsor of the show, with Enirgi Group backing the event as sponsor and DB Schenker as the logistics partner.

MEGATRANS2018 is also supported by a range of association partners, including the Australian Logistics Council (ALC); Victorian Transport Association (VTA); the Australian Peak Shippers Association (APSA) and the Freight & Trade Alliance (FTA); ARTSA; the National Transport Commission (NTC); and TCA. PACE

AUTOMATION SOFTWARE

The road to a sustainable plant upgrade Being up front and looking out for your client’s best interests can lead to a long-term beneficial relationship for both companies. PACE explains.

Many things need to be taken into consideration with clients such as the type of software needed and its compatibility with the hardware.

M

etquip Systems general manager Jose Lobato is a passionate man. It shows in how he talks and the enthusiasm he exhibits when explaining what his company does.

Maybe it’s because he’s been in the industry for more than 30 years. Or it could be because he’s seen all the misfortune and mistakes companies make. He has also witnessed companies advance and succeed in an environment that not always looks favourable. It might be a combination

of all these things. But if you spend enough time with him, you know that his passion is all about Australia’s manufacturing and automation scenery as he truly believes that there is a bright future.

Being an automation software specialist since 1988, Metquip Systems has always been associated with brand names such as Wonderware and Thin Manager, both of which were built to facilitate and make automation easier. These products are essential when it comes

to plant enhancements. The industrial automation landscape and sector has changed markedly in the past two decades, which means clients’ expectations have now changed, too.

“In the old days we used to deliver solutions via shrink-wrapped products that were sourced purely on their features,” said Lobato. “Today, it’s a much more complex engagement with our customers. Not because it’s hard, but because you touch on so many other areas in the operational and manufacturing domains. It’s no

longer as simple as giving a box to the courier containing CDs that get installed, establishing a connection to your PLC and then developing your HMI mimics. Today, more than ever, there is the transfer of knowledge and the utilisation of information that brings it to the next level in the automation space.”

To complicate matters many companies have consolidated their workforce by removing their own engineering and automation sections which, in turn, has caused a number

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 www.pacetoday.com.au 25

AUTOMATION SOFTWARE

of long-term problems.

There was a trend 10-15 years ago with many end users and production suppliers where they decided to remove their in-house engineering capabilities and expertise.

“We saw companies that had teams of up to a dozen expert engineers reduce them to one or zero,” said Lobato. “Manufacturers saved money because they reduced staffing levels, wages and overheads, but by the same token there has been a loss of control and direction of their operations. They went out to contractors and put their operational side into the hands of companies that made their decision to suit them rather than the company itself. These days we are seeing a resurgence in many end users having a smaller team of engineers that are more focused on standardisation strategies, full governance of automation programs to increase operational throughput, increase efficiency and continuous improvement plans.

More importantly, we are seeing more requests to integrate plant floor information and data into the administration and operational layer of the organisation.”

Another notable change is how Metquip Systems approaches its customers with regard to their software needs and requirements.

Back in the day, it was a case of bombarding clients with pretty pictures, information and product features and then delivering the latest product releases. According to Lobato, that had to change simply because the customer’s expectations are now different.

“Today, I literally walk into a customer’s facilities to quantify their problems and where they are heading in terms of strategy for increasing throughput and efficiency in their manufacturing space,” said Lobato.

“In terms of a new customer, I go there to find what their pain points are. The engagement from our end is pretty much consultative to give them direction and advice. Most importantly I am there to help them apply the products to solve their problems. Metquip Systems is taking a more consultative and advisory role rather than being a product supplier.”

Lobato points out there are many things that need to be taken into

consideration with clients – the type of software needed; is it compatible with the hardware; and who on the ground is going to implement it? And are they even qualified?

Lobato cites the case of a wellknown food producer it has worked with over a 20-year period. Metquip Systems and the company first came across each other in 1998 when the manufacturer needed to upgrade its plant.

The company did a major upgrade of their facilities and put in a batch management handling system, which was considered the latest and best batch processing site.

“What has happened next is classic,” said Lobato. “The main contract was given to an outside company who we worked with.

They delivered the solution and then handed it over to the client. From that point is where the problems started. Back then the plant people were isolated from management.

“Ultimately the plant people were left to do what they wanted, which can be dangerous because they had no standards and their own separate network,” said Lobato. “The system was never updated. They used old

hardware and never updated the batch management software. Slowly but surely the whole batch processing system was antiquated and the HMI screen resolution was poor. It came to a point where the management was made aware that they had to do something because they were running a huge risk with no clear automation strategy, and no solid back-up strategy, let alone a planned disaster recovery, in place.”

One of the managers who had been part of the company when Metquip Systems first became involved in 1998 started taking an interest in where the company was heading and didn’t like what he saw.

It came to a point where he knew that they were in trouble not only due to antiquated systems, but also because there was no back-up system in place.

“We spent months and numerous meetings with the IT personnel, management and with the plant people,” said Lobato. “They had to engage an engineer to go and do an audit. The audit was to quantify what they had on the shop floor.”

What the audit found was alarming. With the advent of the IIoT and Industry 4.0, sometimes

Engaging with customers is more complex because service providers touch on many areas in the operational and manufacturing domains.

26 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

security is left in the ether, with no real systems in place. In the past, somebody had installed a router that was open in the factory. It was not password protected so anybody close enough could grab the signal and had access to the system and could have hacked into it.

“That was just one thing we discovered,” said Lobato. “Anybody could access the network that was part of the batch management system and destroy it if they wanted to. They even introduced their own PC games to the network and were accessing the Internet. It was the classic case of what not to do.”

Lobato said Metquip Systems takes pride in supplying on time. However, once they got involved in the upgrade it took a little longer. He didn’t mind, neither did the client, as long as they got it right.

“They really put the money and resources to put a proper remedy in place,” said Lobato. “We came in to assist with upgrading the application and the software into the latest Microsoft platform and product version. That was a big challenge.

Then we had to rehash the application to go into the latest hardware. That

AUTOMATION SOFTWARE

was another big challenge. It took us four months to do. We had to dig in and complete the task as production had to continue.”

There were a couple of key considerations that made ThinManager a good choice for the upgrade, not least its ability to recover data as well as how it managed to fit in with the company’s terminal services.

“Terminal services are when you have a big server with an application where you have your clients connecting into that application that runs centrally,” said Lobato. “This is why it’s called thin client architecture.

The old technology commonly referred as fat client, is when you have an application that you run in individual PCs that operates by itself. That means that when you do an upgrade with a fat client you might have 15 machines, which means you have to do 15 upgrades.

Whereas with the thin client system and terminal services you only do one upgrade. ThinManager will provide

many added features and extend this network to cover mobility clients like smart phones, tablets, iPads and more. It can also restore a failed client in less than 15 minutes whereas with the old fat client individual PCs the system recovery could take up to a day or more. This will impact on down time and productivity losses, which will be a nightmare for the production and accounting sections.”

Metquip Systems also introduced the adoption of “Best Practices in IT” concept by making the IT sections and the plant floor team work together towards a common goal during this upgrade.

“With today’s modern technology it does not make economic or practical sense to have a robust and solid IT strategy catering for cyber security, disaster recovery and network optimisation and only cover one part of a plant while leaving other parts exposed,” said Lobato.

Metquip Systems worked with IT for the production systems to gain access of the company’s IT

infrastructure convincing them to adopt virtualisation, a new technology whereby a virtual server is installed inside a large hard drive or tower. If there were six or 10 servers in the old days, it is now possible to have 10 virtual machines environments inside one. This was another transition Metquip Systems added in to this upgrade itself.

Now the upgrade has been completed, Lobato said the next stage will begin, which they hope to start soon.

“This means that a strategy for OEE (overall equipment efficiency) is not only realistic but can be executed rapidly,” said Lobato. “Another strategy can cover traceability and tracking of the food production system – from raw materials to finished product and then the reconciliation of the financial system.

“We know they have got a number of bottleneck points in the factory that are causing tremendous downtime. We need to identify under which conditions these bottlenecks

occur and prevent these conditions.”

When it is all done, Lobato wants to be left with not just a happy client but another world-class operation that is a showcase to the rest of the world.

All these upgrades have one purpose: making Australian manufacturing and process engineering great again.

“The general perception is that Australian manufacturing is too expensive and we don’t know how to operate plants,” said Lobato. “If you apply a proper automation strategy, if you focus on the operational efficiency to maximise throughput and you adopt best practices under proper governance, we will have facilities that compete easily in the world market including the Asian economies.

“We have got clients that are already doing this and do not see why many more cannot do the same. We need the country behind this and the press reporting success on what can be done rather than focusing on the negatives.” PACE

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OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 www.pacetoday.com.au 27

DIGITISATION

Embracing digitisation – collaboration is the key ABB is at the cutting edge of the Internet of Things and automation. However, even a big player in the market realises that partnerships are a key ingredient when negotiating the current trends in the process and control space. PACE explains.

E

ven with the latest technologies and connectivity within the process and control space, when it comes to digitisation, no one company or person has enough expertise to know it all. This is not only because there is a lot to learn, but also because the landscape is changing so fast – sometimes on a monthly or even weekly basis.

ABB is a company that prides itself on the knowledge and expertise it has in the automation and robotics space. However, when it comes to the Internet of Things (IoT), it also realises that selective business

partnerships are key to its success.

“If you look at the way learning develops, it is no longer in nice, discrete verticals,” said ABB Australia’s business development manager Simon DeBell.

“Here, we’re talking about things that don’t necessarily take place within one company. ABB believes it has the applications expertise to understand the IoT environment. But when it comes to capitalising on the trends around the IoT, then we have selected two partners to work with. One is IBM Watson, which provides the computing pattern recognition power for the speed of analytics and presentation options —

28 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

to tackle the complexity of ArtificiaI Intelligence (AI).

“Then we have Microsoft Azure, which is all about accessibility around this partnership between ABB and IBM Watson. It provides accessibility for customers in a secure cloud-based environment. In the past, I’m certain ABB would have tried to do a lot of those things in house.”

ABB also recognised early on that in order to get onboard with the digitisation of industry, developing key partnerships with clients was also important. Not just in the sense of the traditional provider/customer

relationship, but one that is more symbiotic and open to suggestions from both sides.

“The trend we are seeing in a some industries – you’re seeing it in marine and offshore platforms and remote mine sites – is that no client can be confident that they have all the expertise they need to address any particular issue that arises,” said DeBell. “You’d need an army of people. Economics doesn’t allow them to do that, assuming they could even recruit them.”

This leads to the next observation about digitisation and how it lends itself to the immediacy of how groups

DIGITISATION

“The way people will work together will alter” of people can get together and solve problems without having to be in the same room. This is not like a conference call situation. De Bell is talking about being able to share complicated information – whether it be computer modelling, infographic or video – and making instant decisions/changes in real time without having to go through a series of back and forths.

This is now going to be the norm, according to DeBell. However, he also points out there are a few other issues that need fixing first.

“Originally companies had their own communication protocols and they could be confident that the systems would perform as they had designed them in the way their clients wanted them,” said DeBell. “But then clients got a little uncomfortable about this because they said, ‘How do we deal with a situation caused by incompatibility?’

We have effectively inherited a system

from different vendors and the technologies they come from means that one vendor’s product may be a different generation from the other. The customers themselves are now pushing towards open standards and more interoperability.”

Once standardisation has been implemented, then the next issue is that of security.

“As soon as you take the industry in one direction, then people turn around and say ‘It’s a little bit too open’,” said DeBell. “And then you get concerns about cyber security. So, you get other factors that are overlaid on top of that.

Essentially you’ve created a room that you have to make sure is secure. You now have to make sure that the firewall is not going to be breached and data security compromised otherwise you have other issues that arise particularly when the information is digitised.”

The employment conundrum Once this has been addressed, the last piece in the collaboration puzzle is – what about the individual? When it comes to digitisation, AI and robotics are not far behind. Can you collaborate

with AI when there’s a perception that it’s a technology that’s out to make some jobs for humans obsolete?

“History shows that automation doesn’t necessarily reduce employment,” said De Bell. “What it does do is change the nature of the employment.

I was looking on one of the federal government websites a few weeks ago and they were estimating that something like 15,000 jobs were created in the information and communications technology (ICT) space because new technologies are offering new opportunities. These are not necessarily focused on that narrow ICT. These are broader jobs.”

While DeBell understands that it is unsettling for people to lose their jobs as automation performs tasks faster, and more accurately, they can also look at it as a time to upskill. This is impacting professional roles as well as blue collar jobs.

“The interesting aspect for me is how I see skills changing. The way people will work together will alter,” said DeBell. “I think that the collaborative working environment is going to be much more pronounced

than it is now. The knowledge curve is constantly being pushed because data analytics enables speed and as things have become more capable of being automated I think the role of the human being changes.”

DeBell said it’s not so much about automation taking over jobs, but about technology help us moving forward, too. We can’t afford to be static in developing and adopting new technologies because they’re going to get deployed anyway. So, why not be at the forefront?

“Some people say [automation] is going to be very threatening but I think it is [only] threatening if you’re satisfied with the world as it is,” he said. “What we can say now is that the development and adoption of disruptive technologies is inevitable and unavoidable. ABB doesn’t tend to think about disruptive technologies, we tend to think about enabling technologies. Disruptive seems to suggest that everything is steady and a steady world is always the way the world should be. Whereas enabling technologies is all about progression and that’s the way the various industrial revolutions have come about.” PACE

A key to digitisation is that it can help solve complex problems without people having to be in the same room.

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 www.pacetoday.com.au 29

Best PLC, HMI and Sensor Product – VEGA, Vegapuls 69 This year’s 2017 Zenith Award recipients offered a brilliant array of cutting edge technologies and products.

Congratulations to all our winners.

Proudly sponsored by

V

ega has long been at the cutting edge of sensor technology and the Vegapuls 69 is no

exception to its range of products.

Designed for the continuous level measurement of bulk solids in both small and large vessel heights, the Vegapuls 69 can continuously measure bulk solids under many different process conditions.

The types of areas the Vegapuls 69 is ideal for being used in are very high silos, large bunkers and segmented vessels to name a few.

There are many reasons why it is suitable or these environments including that it has excellent signal focusing and simple setup, which all makes for accurate measurement. It can be equipped with an encapsulated plastic antenna or it is possible to have a lens antenna, integrated in the metal flange. This feature allows the sensor to be adapted to various

application areas.

Features that stood out for the judges included its ability to give reliable measurement data even when surrounded by dust and noise – two distractions that can sometimes lead to unreliable readouts. It also has maintenancefree operation through its non-contact measuring principle. PACE

Vega’s John Leadbetter (left) receives the awards for Best PLC, HMI and sensor product from Bestech’s Tony Gobriel.

30 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

Best Network Implementation – Matthews Australasia, Manufacturing Traceability Proudly sponsored by

T

his project involved a customer in the dairy industry that wanted to enter the Chinese market with baby formula but had to meet the strict guidelines that were recently introduced by the Chinese government.

A deadly 2008 melamine contamination of local formula created preference for Australian product, which has a reputation for high quality. However, importing manufacturers have to work with the Certification and Accreditation Administration of China (CNCA), plus meet a series of strict traceability requirements under the Infant Formula Milk Powder Production License Examination Rules (2013).

The dairy company needed to have strong product traceability and authentication processes in place to meet guidelines and gain Chinese Government accreditation.

Matthews Australasia looked at how the information about product authenticity could be safely provided in a simple format that consumers in China could scan/access intuitively, easily and quickly.

WeChat is a popular messaging platform in China, and is regarded as the local Facebook. It has an embedded QR code scanner that consumers are familiar with and use frequently. Matthews used this insight and tapped into this consumer trend to develop the solution.

If people can scan a QR code

using the scanner embedded into WeChat, utilisation increases significantly, whereas take-up rate is markedly lower if they have to download a specific app first.

Matthews developed the solution in partnership with a cloud-based platform that provided advanced cryptographic code-generation and fraud-tracking algorithms, as well as the consumer interface to track where the product is scanned.

The solution uses a Matthews’ Solaris laser to mark each tin with a unique, serialised QR code, generated by the cloud-based provider. Matthews’ production-line software iDSnet integrates with the code provider and the Solaris laser scribing system on the production line, providing the customer with an end-to-end solution.

Using smartphones, consumers

32 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

in China can scan the QR codes, via WeChat, on individual formula tins to identify and authenticate that individual product and see its history.

Scanned information also shows key data about company/brand, Australian dairy products, and how best to consume the product.

Once the customer gained Chinese Government accreditation, they couldn’t manufacture without this solution, so the time frames were challenging and all parties were under a lot of pressure to develop, test and install the solution within a period of eight weeks.

The solution Matthews implemented meets several criteria across the Australian manufacturer’s business, process, supply chain and product needs.

It gives the customer the ability to track and trace product globally.

It was this effectiveness that resulted in the Chinese Government granting them import accreditation, enabling them to sign deals with distributors, knowing the anti-counterfeiting measures will protect their brand and also protect consumers from potentially health-damaging fakes.

Product authentication can occur throughout the supply chain, whether in the factory or by the consumer in the supermarket aisle.

All scans are geotagged via dashboard reporting, so Matthews’ customer can view exactly where its product has been distributed and sold anywhere in the world. This also supports improved knowledge of its product distribution in real time. The system is also designed to support tracking and providing automatic alerts in the event of a suspicious scanning activity. PACE

David Alexander (left) from Matthews Australasia with Beckhoff managing director Steven Sischy.

Machine Builder of the Year – HMPS, HMPS5000 Wraparound Case Packer Proudly sponsored by

H

MPS developed a solution to automate the end-of-line requirements for a food manufacturer that needed minimal operator involvement, while adhering to the health requirements of the food and beverage industry.

The challenge was the number of variables the machines had to deal with; it took one machine to pack

up to 12 product formats of between 180g and 260g with an output speed of 10-30 cartons per minute.

Industry demanded that machinery handles many products at one time. This has become more commonplace where customers use one machine to pack various product lines. So the machine needed to be robust and flexible.

The process had to be achieved seamlessly and with minimal changeover time. The HMPS500 was designed to place boxes of dry food into larger cartons, ready for palletising and shipping, and was required to be easy to maintain, clean and operate.

It was required to do multiple functions and had to be easy to set up for various product lines.

Its design meant that with the push of a button the changeover between product lines could be achieved within minutes.

Products enter the system on an infeed conveyor system, which allows product to either continue travelling narrow-face leading into the case packer, or with the use of two differential speed belts, rotate 90-degrees to wide-face leading.

The inners then travel towards to a servo-driven water wheel, standing them upright into a servo-driven index system. Once the correct

carton quantity is collated they are then driven up to a servo side shift before being transferred into the carton by a Delta Robot.

Simultaneously, a flat wraparound blank is erected in Station 1 before being transferred and positioned in the loading station where the collation of products is loaded. From here the minor flaps are folded, fully locating the product, and then the hot-melt adhesive is applied.

The cartons are compressed to complete the sealing and then side transferred as the firmly bonded cartons are discharged from the machine to await palletising. PACE

Warren Booker (left) accepts the award on behalf of HMPS from Daanet’s Martin Reynolds representing B&R Automation. Automation’s Martin Reynolds.

34 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

Integrated automation had its day:

The future belongs to Scalability+ www.br-automation.com/ScalabilityPlus

Your machine technology Our technology packages Integrated automation PCs & Panels PLC systems Scalability+ takes integrated automation into a whole new dimension. We enrich our extensive and seamlessly integrated hardware portfolio with a large set of technology packages. The openness of our platform enables our customers to turn their core competencies into a highly competitive solution and take machinery to the next level.

Motion control Safety technology

Manufacturing Control – Matthews Australasia, Egg Packaging Integrated Inspection Proudly sponsored by

E

gg-packaging is an environment where events happen at pace. This was a project that involved a company that was running several different production lines with different brands and egg sizes, so it was important to get a system that worked without causing

any problems on the line.

These egg cartons, or inners, needed to go into specific shipper cartons, or outers, for transportation. All the production lines finally merge into one line once the inners are stacked into shippers.

To avoid quality issues, Matthews installed an integrated inspection solution where camerabased vision inspection looked into the shippers before they were closed.

This was to check that the barcode on the inner was matched with the barcode on the shipper, to verify if the right cartons/consumer units

were in the right shipping boxes.

Once it was confirmed that the inners and outers matched, details were printed on the cartons, such as the use-by date and batch information. This information was sent to a central database for realtime reporting so line supervisors and managers could support production line efficiencies.

This was a challenging application because the barcode for the inner had to be read once it was put inside the shipper.

To save the customer money, Matthews implemented the solution

after the production lines merged.

This way, the company only needed one system instead of multiple systems on the individual packing lanes. It was a challenging project because any one of the different stock-keeping units (SKUs) could come down the line. This meant that the inspection solution needed to verify if the shipper matched the inner at a scan rate of greater than 99 per cent to minimise no scans and downtime.

The implementation was a success and the customer KPIs were exceeded. PACE

Matthews Australasia regional sales manager David Alexander (left) with IICA NSW chairman Peter Veron.

36 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

2017 ZENITH FINALISTS

Mining and Mineral Process Control – Columbus Group, Double Bed Mining System Proudly sponsored by

C

olumbus Group’s double-bed mining system was built by a combination of two flat-bed mixers with tesselated surfaces under distributed network field control. The system is designed to achieve crushing, assaying,

mixing, concentration and overall processing with waste movement to the ‘just-mined’ aggregate that is left behind the machine.

The main structure is built to cut the ore body into tiny tetrahedrals and octahedrals using high waterpressure, gel grit and computercontrolled jetting that pushes the ore elements into the main space between the two flat beds. The system moves forward with four upper and lower friction crawlers.

It is connected to its control centre with three main cables that

include a high water-pressure feed, grit feed, two-way management and guidance electronics. The main waste materials are packed into the ‘just mined’ area to reduce the majority handling of tailings that need to be pumped away.

The Double Bed Mining System solution builds on establishing water cutting and localised processing to create a safer mining environment with most functions happening underground without explosives.

It was also designed to improve energy efficiency with most of the

(heavy and waste) transport options not required.

When it comes to environmental and land stability considerations, the tailings are used to fill the just-mined voids directly behind the machine. There is automated redundancy that uses the mix-andmatch “Mexican wave” tesselated and tough surface options. There is also said to be less critical pinch points in the whole operations process so redundancy ensures 24/7 production operations, which helps with cash flow consistency. PACE

PACE editor Mike Wheeler (left) and Columbus Group’s Graham Atkins.

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 www.pacetoday.com.au 37

Water and Wastewater Control – CST Wastewater Solutions, RAPTOR Proudly sponsored by

T

echnologies that can create energy from waste are in high demand and the Rapid Transformation of Organic Residues (RAPTOR) device is no exception. It extracts biogas from virtually any biological waste stream, including municipal food wastes from restaurants, food

service facilities, grocery stores, and municipal solid waste, as well as organic wastes from industrial processing facilities, food and beverage plants and agribusinesses.

Suitable substrates can be liquid slurries or wet solid residues.

A RAPTOR plant always starts with liquid storage tanks or solid substrate storage boxes, tanks, bunkers or silos.

Solid substrate is more or less continuously extracted from the reception and storage boxes into the slurring stage. A slurry is prepared in a quick mixer device, consisting of a

hopper with a rugged double-shaft disk shredder, liquid inlet pipe and a slurry extraction pump. Liquid is then automatically added in a suitable amount to convert the solids substrate into a liquid slurry.

When treating different wastes, the art of blending the substrates is key to the successful operation of a RAPTOR plant.

Diverse substrates require a range of different pre-treatments to improve the performance of the rapid digestion process to deliver the highest possible conversion efficiency. RAPTOR plants

Jack Mallen-Cooper (left) accepts the award on behalf of CST Wastewater Solutions from MEGATRANS2018’s Emelia Hinge.

38 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

can consist of one or more of pre-treatments including enzymatic, chemical, thermal, biological and mechanical.

The suitably pre-treated and blended substrate slurry is then transferred into a mixed digester. Because solids digestion occurs two times faster at high temperature than low temperature, thermophilic digestion (50°C-55°C) is usually preferred. High nitrogen substrates require mesophilic digestion at 35°C-40°C, or at an intermediate temperature.

The Anamix digester system uses energy-efficient and low-maintenance mechanical mixing with a large top entry mixer, and is available in sizes up to 3.2 mg. Depending on the application, optional extras include a foam breaker fan, a scum buster system or a (sloped) bottom grit trap. Different reactor configurations can also be used.

Tanks are always fully insulated and heated externally, by recycling the digester content through a special heat exchanger. Depending on the substrate, loading rates of up to 10–15 kg COD/m3 per day and high biogas production rates per unit reactor volume can be obtained in RAPTOR plants.

The Anamix reactor digestate is usually treated in a centrifuge for removal and disposal of the non-digestible solids (wet sludge cake), which are ideal as fertiliser in agriculture. Sludge cake drying and pelletising systems are also available on request.

The liquid concentrate constitutes a small wastewater stream, recycled to add to the fresh solid waste in the slurry-making stage, or recycled to a TAR pre-treatment, disposed of in a conventional anaerobic/aerobic or aerobic wastewater treatment plant, or treated in a dedicated wastewater treatment plant. PACE

2017 ZENITH FINALISTS

Young Achiever of the Year – Michaela Craft, BOC Limited Proudly sponsored by

I

t’s been a big year for Zenith’s Young Achiever of the Year Michaela Craft. Having already taken out the Rising Star of the Year at the Women in Industry Awards in June, Craft made it a double at PACE’s annual awards ceremony.

Craft joined BOC in 2014 as a remote operations engineer after being a graduate process developer at MARS. This role at BOC involved responsibility for starting up, shutting down and optimising up to 40 different tonnage and merchant plants across the South Pacific region.

While working in that role, Craft learned about the maintenance and safe operation of LNG and CO2 plants, ozone production facilities, air separation units and liquid helium production facilities.

Other responsibilities included the controlled starting and stopping of plant to avoid maximum demand spikes, monitoring spot pricing in the electricity market, and peak and off peak plant optimisation to minimise electricity costs and optimise customer supply.

In early 2016, Craft was promoted to energy coordinator.

In this role, she worked with an end-to-end approach for the strategic procurement of electricity, natural gas and Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) for a large number of BOC and Elgas sites across Australia and New Zealand.

Craft’s promotion to energy coordinator coincided with the departure of a senior staff

member, which meant she was required to oversee additional senior responsibilities, including optimisation projects and supplier contract negotiations.

“I am very grateful for the recognition of winning the PACE Young Achiever award,” said Craft. “Engineering is a very male-

dominated industry however since working at BOC I have never felt at a disadvantage because I am female. BOC is an organisation that promotes and celebrates success and does not allow age or gender to limit opportunities to succeed.

“I am also thankful to my managers and colleagues at BOC

who have created an environment where mistakes are regarded as learning opportunities, personal development is encouraged, and mentoring is always available. This has created a workplace that not only challenges my thinking, but is also one that I enjoy coming to every day.” PACE

SICK’s Strategic Industry Manager - Mining, Graham Robson (left), with Young Achiever of the Year Michaela Craft.

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 www.pacetoday.com.au 39

Power and Energy Management – Nano-Nouvelle, Lithium-Ion Battery Project Proudly sponsored by

N

ano-Nouvelle is a Sunshine Coast-based company that designs nanotechnology materials that are set to boost the energy storage capacity of lithium-ion batteries by as much as 50 per cent.

Earlier this year, the company worked with US-based Polaris Battery Labs to apply a graphite layer to

Polaris’ copper-coated nanomaterial, Copper Lumafoil. The trial proved graphite adheres well to Lumafoil’s porous nanostructure and that the material is strong enough to work in battery manufacturing lines.

Nano-Nouvelle received a $422,201 grant from the Australian Government’s Federal Commercialisation Grant Initiative that helps Australian companies undertake commercialisation activities to bring their new products, processes and services to market.

The trial demonstrated that Lumafoil is a plug-and-play

replacement for solid copper current collectors in batteries.

Nano-Nouvelle’s Lumafoil current collector can produce lighter lithium ion batteries and can potentially lower costs through quicker assembly and extend battery life through better active material adhesion.

Rechargeable lithium-ion batteries are used for an increasing number of applications, from mobile devices to Tesla Powerwall home batteries.

However, despite incremental improvements in battery performance, present-day components are limited in their capacity to deliver the results consumers expect.

Nano-Nouvelle believes that next-generation nanomaterials, based on a porous polymer membrane substrate, can deliver improvements in battery performance with responsive three-dimensional nano-surfaces that overcome the limitations of present-day materials.

Nano-Nouvelle’s Copper Lumafoil replaces solid metal foil current collectors, which conduct stored electricity to an outside circuit. Copper Lumafoil weighs as much as 70 per cent less than existing current collectors used in lithium-ion batteries. PACE

PACE managing editor Syed Shah (left) with COG representative Christine Clancy.

40 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

2017 ZENITH FINALISTS

Safety System Innovation – YUMARR Automation, JumboGuard Proudly sponsored by

F

ounded in 2016, YUMARR Automation is a technology company focused on the development of safety and automation systems for the mining, agriculture and transportation industries.

YUMARR’s JumboGuard has been designed as a laser scannerbased assistance system that protects the operating crew of mobile underground drill rigs called Jumbos.

Building the frontline of an underground mine is a critical part of the mining operation. The risk of inadvertent contact with moving booms and entanglement in rotating drill steels continues to be an industry-wide problem when people are working with underground drill rigs. To manage this hazard, safety procedures have been implemented, but due to human factors, incidents are still occurring. JumboGuard reduces the risk of human errors.

YUMARR designed the system to be retrofitted to all types of underground drilling equipment such as rock and cable bolters, as well as face drill rigs.

As an additional layer of protection JumboGuard integrates into existing drill infrastructure and hydraulic control.

Installing anchor bolts and steel mesh to support the tunnel walls requires mine personnel to enter a danger zone and work in direct proximity of the moving parts of the machine.

JumboGuard observes the machine surrounding and monitors

the movement of persons. If anyone enters the danger zone, JumboGuard detects the hazard and automatically stops the boom’s hydraulics, blocking the rotation of drill and movement of the boom. As long as there is someone remaining in the danger zone, JumboGuard actively prevents the reactivation of the machine. This is possible due to an intelligent person-counting algorithm guarding the danger zone entry and exit. This is a lifesaving safety feature of JumboGuard.

The rough conditions and

the complexity of the mining environment pose difficulties on every sensor system with the task to measure the surroundings.

As laser scanners form the ‘eyes’ of JumboGuard, the challenge was to develop the ‘brain’ – software that was able to perceive and interpret the complex interactions of humans, the machine and the environment.

Mud, dust, water spray, multiple operators, high temperatures and long working hours were a few of the challenges YUMARR needed to teach the software to recognise and overcome.

Having the early system in the real working conditions, a short feedback loop for system performance and upgrades and gaining invaluable insight from operators was essential for YUMARR to reach such a high level of situational awareness and exceed its customers’ expectations.

The first JumboGuard systems have been installed in mines sites at several locations throughout Australia including the Northern Territory, New South Wales and South Australia. PACE

Evan Cardinal from YUMARR with the Safety System Innovation Award.

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 www.pacetoday.com.au 41

E FEATUR L A N TIO ion PROMO calibrat d n a n io ntat strume

In

Calibration key to top-performing instruments

J

ust over twelve years ago George Maharage created Pacific Sensor Technologies (PST) after he saw a gap in the market and knew he had the expertise and drive to meet the requirements of a demanding industry. Not long after, Don Pretorius came on board and since then both men have built the company to become a reliable and go-to entity when it comes to instrumentation and sensor technology, as well as being experts in instrumentation calibration.

PST’s product lines service some of the most critical sectors in Australia’s industrial landscape including food and beverage, medical, mining, scientific and chemical.

These products are designed to not only save time and money, but to be some of the best instrumentation devices available on the market.

PST’s expert staff have an intimate knowledge of what makes data loggers, temperature and humidity sensors, probes and water quality instruments tick.

One such product is the Madgetech AVS140-6 Autoclave validation data logging system.

Included in the system is the HiTemp 140 temperature data logger

that is built for use with autoclaves and can withstand harsh environments of temperatures of up to 140˚C. More importantly it has an accuracy of +/-0.1˚C, which is critical for processes where temperature is a crucial measuring stick such as the sterilisation industry.

Also part of the package is the PR140, a high-precision, stainless-steel submersible, pressure data logger that can withstand temperatures of up to 140˚C. It can also store a massive 32,000+ readings in its system. It also has a built-in high-precision pressure gauge.

While it’s great to have a set of instruments such as the Madgetech AVS140-6 that help with the measurement of an array of media, if they have not been calibrated properly, then their purpose is pointless. Not only would false readings be recorded, in some cases they could lead to serious issues for the company who is using the equipment. Take the food and beverage industry for instance.

Having the correct temperature on a production line is essential. Too much heat might spoil the food, while not enough might encourage the growth of harmful bacteria.

PST’s calibration laboratory The scope of the calibration covers humidity, temperature (including infra red), pressure and sound.

Calibration is important because it makes sure an instrument meets the standards it has been designed to adhere.

42 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

has been set up to make sure instrumentation meets the standards it has been designed to adhere. These calibration certificates not only let users know their equipment is up to scratch but also proves what it has been developed to do.

The scope of the calibration covers humidity, temperature (including infra red), pressure and sound. PST can also put clients in touch with third-party calibration services that cover voltage, shock and current logger calibration.

PST advises that calibration on

most instrumentation be carried out at least annually, but can vary due to the sensitivity of the equipment being tested.

Moving forward, the company wants to build on its already obtained ISO certification by also gaining National Association of Testing Authorities (NATA) accreditation.

While the process is long, it is also thorough, which means clients know that their products will be calibrated to perform at the highest possible standard. PACE

DATA LOGGERS, TEMPERATURE, HUMIDITY SENSORS AND INSTRUMENTATION FOR ANY APPLICATION SPECIALIST SALES, SERVICE AND CALIBRATION PACIFIC SENSOR TECHNOLOGIES PTY LTD

1300 662 720 SALES@PACIFICSENSORTECH.COM.AU WWW.PACIFICSENSORTECH.COM.AU

Industry Online measurement and alarms, recording and monitoring of production processes

Building Management - HVAC Complete temperature, humidity, pressure & CO2 monitoring in new buildings, historic buildings, industrial centres

Small Office and Home Office Low cost solution for monitoring, remote access to the measured values and data collection through data loggers and Web Sensors

Server Rooms and Data Centres Record and online monitoring of temperature and humidity, leaks and smoke in data centres and server rooms. Data loggers, sensors, monitoring systems for IT racks

Monitoring during Transport of food, flowers, live animals, pharmaceuticals, HACCP. Wireless communications and data transmission via GPRS

Laboratories Automated monitoring of temperature, humidity and other parameters in pharmacies, laboratories, blood banks and areas that require constant monitoring

Ask about our Calibration Services Pacific Sensor Technologies calibration laboratory offers a variety of standard and customized calibration services, including certificate traceable to national standards. The scope of this service covers temperature (Including Infra Red), humidity, sound and pressure.

PROMOTIONAL FEATURE Automation and Robotics

Young women encouraged to follow their dreams in robotics More than 100 Year 9 and 10 female students recently learned about some of the exciting career opportunities available to them in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects at an event held in early September at The University of Western Australia.

G

irls in Engineering Discovery Day is part of the Girls in Engineering program at University of Western Australia. The event aimed to inspire young women breaking gender stereotypes and encouraging them to pursue a career in STEM that they are passionate about.

A report issued by the Office of the Chief Scientist in 2016 estimated that only around 16 per cent of Australia’s qualified STEM workers were female.

The students got involved in activities ranging from working in robotics and programming miniature robots, to developing prosthetic limbs, as well as using virtual reality systems to create experiences that help those with physical and mental impairments. They completed activities to understand how algorithms, patterns, and maths can be used to help solve some of the world’s most complex problems.

A keynote speech by world leader in cancer research Professor Christobel Saunders from UWA Medical School’s surgery division, who was also a recent recipient of a Premier’s Science Award, was a highlight of the day, with Saunders imparting her knowledge and advice to the students.

Saunders said engineering was a wonderful career for women with incredibly broad options and the opportunity to make a big difference.

“It’s not just about building roads or machines that go ‘bang’, engineering is a hugely diverse career that encompasses a lot of other things within science,” Saunders said.

“I think inspiring young women is really important and it’s also important to help them realise that there is a spark there and you really can make a difference in the world

through what you choose to study.

“This is an incredibly bright bunch of motivated girls and I’d love to see them enjoy a rewarding career in STEM.” One company that supports these kinds of initiatives is automation specialists Bosch. From an industry perspective, Bosch Australia HR manager Jess Sherlock said the program is a great idea.

“Opportunity for careers in non-traditional engineering domains are increasing,” she said. “At Bosch we

44 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

have everything from automotive to the Internet of Things to agriculture technology.

“We are seeing an increase in young women interested in careers that make the world a better place through what they choose to study.

For a company like ours, STEM-based roles are important for our future.”

St Hilda’s Anglican School for Girls student Amy Boyd, 14, of Bicton said the event was a rewarding experience and opened up many possibilities of what she might like to

study once school has finished.

“I really enjoyed the work we did using virtual reality, the possible uses of this technology to improve areas such as medicine and how it can be used to carry out different surgeries without needing to hurt anyone or be invasive,” Boyd said.

“I’m interested in pursuing a career in chemical and biomedical engineering which looks pretty fun and it was great to see some of the options in practice at the Girls in Engineering Discovery Day.” PACE

It is estimated that approximately 16 per cent of Australia’s qualifed STEM workers are female.

Bosch Australia Manufacturing Your partner in Automation & Robotics

Bosch Australia Manufacturing Solutions. Your partner in automation & robotics

INDUSTRY SECTORS t "(3*$6-563"- t 1)"3."$&65*$"- t "650.05*7& t .&%*$"- t .*/*/( t ."/6'"$563*/( t &/&3(: The team at Bosch use a cross functional approach to identify current manufacturing issues and work with the teams on site to develop solutions based on the needs of the business. I have been impressed by the ability of the Bosch team to engage our production staff to open up about current manufacturing issues and ensure their suggestions and proposals are explored and assessed.

APAS assistant collaborative robot

Shay Wilkinson TheTeam APASLeader assistant is a versatile automatic production assistant. As an intelligent and intrinsically – Process Engineering safe robot system, the APAS assistant allows direct collaboration with people without expensive Cook Medical

additional shielding. This is made possible by the unique sensor skin, which covers the robot arm of the APAS assistant and which reacts, as soon as somebody approaches.

Bosch Australia Manufacturing Solutions is uniquely positioned to deliver you bottom line results from efficiency and productivity gains achieved through the deployment of robotics and automation solutions. Our teams of industry experts specialise in designing, developing and deploying With a breadth of industries and products that extend from the automotive industry, to medical, pharmaceutical, healthcare, food, energy, power bespoke solutions that are tailored to the individual needs of our industry partners. tools, household appliances and whitegoods. With a strong history in supplying equipment to the automotive supply chain, Bosch Manufacturing Automation Lines,of Assembly Equipment, Material Handling, Axis / Robotics / Jigs & Fixtures Solutions now delivers into aAssembly diverse range Industries.

Test and Measurement Product Test Systems, Communication Interfaces, Data Analysis & Data Acquisitions Automation Assembly Line, Assembly Equipment, Material Handling, Axis /Robotics & Jigs & Fixtures Process Technology Dispensing Systems, Riveting, Tightening Systems, & Vision Systems Test & Measurement Product Test Systems, Communication Interfaces, Data Analysis & Data Acquisition Engineering Services Feasibility Studies, Lean Equipment Design, Project Management, System Integration Process Technology Dispensing Systems, Riveting, Tightening Systems & Vision Systems Call one ofServices our industry experts today to discuss how we can help Project you to achieve greaterSystem production efficiencies and bottom line results.

Engineering Feasibility studies, Lean equipment design, Management, Integrators Industry Expert: John Croft The standardized production assistants APAS assistant, APAS inspector and APAS flexpress, as a stand-alone solution or in a manufacturing island, M (61) (0) 434 185 329 are designed for: ad-hoc small series production, semi-automation, pilot production for safeguarding a process, agile engineering with early interim T (03)9541 5086 results and quality tests.

E john.croft@au.bosch.com To W findbosch-manufacturingsolutions.com.au out more contact John Croft M (61) (0) 434 185 329 T (03)9541 5086

PROMOTIONAL FEATURE Backplane Systems Technology

Panel PCs powered by 6th generation iCore processors

H

aving reliable equipment in automated plants is key to making sure that everything runs smoothly when the production process is in progress. Poorly performing equipment can have a knock-on effect that can lead to failure in other parts of the plant. This is why when choosing equipment to run and monitor plants it is advisable that vendors choose wisely.

Backplane Systems Technology has several products in its catalogue

that meet the criteria expected of high-quality equipment in the automation space. This includes Aplex Technologies’ new ARCHMI9XXA series of 12.1-inch to 32-inch Panel PCs, which are powered by Intel’s 6th generation of i5 and i3 iCore processors.

The ARCHMI-9XXA Series supports Intel’s 6th Generation iCore platform and is equipped with Intel HD graphics. It primarily upgrades while offering the balance of

exceptional computing performance and power efficiency, which provides effective real-time monitoring and integrating data transmission.

Also, based on the perfect graphic experience, ARCHMI-9XXA enables users to control complex visual information action. Maintaining stability for continual operation is vital for factory automation. If something goes wrong within the system, it can not only lead to critical failure, but downtime. These kinds of issues not

only cost a company money, but can also have an impact on their reputation. This is why it is necessary to make sure that a panel PC has all the features that make it suitable for a factory’s automated system and why the ARCHMI-9XXA meets the demands on this type of working environment.

The device is capable of expanding the functionality by optional expansion I/O boards, in the TB-528 Series, including Mini-PCIe, CAN bus, POE, USB, and isolation I/O Modules.

This improves competitive advantage through providing critical flexibility and expansibility for the variety of applications and requirements.

The ARCHMI-9XXA supports the smart battery UPS module, so when facing power issues such as voltage spike or reduction in power input, it offers emergency power backup for up to 30 minutes which avoids data loss and protects equipment. This feature is something that some similar devices does not have. Power spikes occur at inopportune times. The emergency power back-up could be the difference between catastrophic power failure within a plant and allowing engineers and maintenance technicians to fix a problem that might arise.

On the threshold of industrial 4.0 revolutions, the ARCHMI9XXA series supports wireless communication (3G/4G LTE/ WiFi/Bluetooth/GPS), diverse I/O interfaces as well as a proprietary expansion slot for intelligent multi-tasking capabilities to meet customized application requirements.

Features of the series includes a PCT/resistive touch screen; one SO-DIMM DDR4 slot that has up to 32GB storage, an IP66-compliant front bezel; easy accessible storage design; and an aluminium die-casting chassis. PACE Backplane Systems Technology P: 02 9457 6400 W: backplane.com.au E: sales@backplane.com.au

46 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

EXPERIENCE EXTREME PERFORMANCE ARCHMI-9XXA SERIES HMI

Featuring the Latest Technology: • Intel Skylake 6th Generation iCore CPU Platform • 12.1”~ 32” Projected Capacitive or Resistive Touch, High Brightness Optional • Supports a Wide Range of I/O Expansion Boards and Smart Battery UPS Module

Contact us now to find out more: P: 02 9457 6400

W: backplane.com.au

E: sales@backplane.com.au

NEW PRODUCTS

Trouble with EMC? Try the pinnacle of screen technology A TOUGH application led to a new generation of VSD cable. The installation demanded the best in screening performance, but also required a flexible cable with the smallest possible bending radius.

LAPP Group created a new product unlike anything currently on the market. The LAPP VSD Ultra gets its name from the special Ultra performance screen.This innovation in design has a 100 per cent copper wrap screen, reducing the resistance of the screen compared to traditional VSD cables. Nobody wants to go back to site to fault find EMC screening issues, so the company has chosen to make the new Ultra Screen the standard for all VSD cable requests. Sizes in stock range from from 1.5mm to 50mm.

LAPP Express Australia lappexpress.com.au/en/ 1800 931 559

Fanless digital signage player with three HDMI outputs BACKPLANE Systems Technology has released iBase Technology’s SI-623-N 4K, Intel core-based fanless digital signage player with three HDMI outputs.

The SI-623-N signage player is based on the 7th/6th generation Intel Core processor and supports up to 4K (3840 x 2160) resolution in each display channel. SI-623-N comes with a pair of wall-mount brackets and can comfortably fit behind multi-displays or video walls deployed in places across every market such as hospitality, retail and public transportation. It is powered by the integrated Intel HD Graphics 530 via 1x HDMI 2.0 and 2x HDMI 1.4 display interface.

SI-623-N is equipped with numerous storage and I/O connectivity including 2x DDR4 SO-DIMM sockets with up to 32GB capacity, 1x RJ-45 for Gigabit LAN, 1x RJ45 for RS-232, 2x USB 3.0, 2x USB 2.0, 1x M.2 B-Key, 1x M.2 M-Key, and 1x 2.5-inch SATA HDD/SSD for storage, 1x SIM and 1x Mini PCI-E slot. The standard SI-623-N model is supplied with 8GB system memory, 128GB SSD and 84W power adaptor.

Backplane Systems 02 9457 6400 www.backplane.com.au

OMRON’s wireless 2JCIE-BL01 sends sensor data to smartphones OMRON Electronic Components’ 2JCIE-BL01 environment sensor is designed to detect the surrounding environment.

It is a compact, battery-operable environmental sensor with seven different sensing capabilities. Developers can use the 2JCIE-BL01 in applications such as home remote monitoring, building automation, outdoor weather monitoring, and factory environment monitoring.

The sensor measures and collects data for a variety of environmental factors that include temperature, humidity, light, ultraviolet (UV) index, barometric pressure, sound, and acceleration (3-axis).

The device transmits collected sensor data via Bluetooth low-energy (BLE) technology over a cloud service using a free downloadable smartphone app.

The sensor offers a communication range of approximately 10 metres, with a data output rate of between one second and 60 minutes. Developers can set threshold values to have the app notify users of environmental changes, abnormal sensor readings and uncomfortable conditions through push notifications. Developers can also set the device to transmit sensor data in broadcaster mode, enabling an environmental monitoring system in combination with common gateway devices.

Omron Industrial Automation Australia 1300 766 766 www.omron.com.au

48 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

NEW PRODUCTS

Helping to put you in Control

Electronic compass with RS-485

A rugged solution for hostile environments NORD’S IEC motors with decentralised frequency inverter comes in ranges from 5.5 kW to 7.5 kW. Energy usage can be reduced by close to 50 per cent with the use of variable speed drives (VSD) to control motors in these applications.

The Nordac Flex SK200E motor comes fitted with an internal EtherCAT card, which connects to a B17 plug. The Nordac Flex SK 200E offers many installation possibilities. Scalable functionality and flexible configuration makes for simple installation and easy maintenance through the plug in capability and parameter transfer via EEPROM memory. This variable speed drive comes in power range up to 22kW, is suitable for wall or motor installation and comes in variants of IP55 and IP66.

Nord Drivesystems 03 9394 0500 www.nord.com

Features a heading accuracy of 0.8° and tilt angle accuracy of 0.2°.

Its small size, low price and IP67 make it ideal for mobile applications.

SKU: SRS-205 Price: $319.00 ea + GST

Programmable Process Indicator Programmable Process Indicator Battery powered 5-digit LCD (24X48mm) 0-10VDC signal input.

SKU: AXI-0062 Price: $109.00 ea + GST

H685 Series 4G Cellular Router serial server and Ethernet and Wi-Fi gateway. It can act as an RS-232 serial cable replacement over the mobile phone network or as a serial server on the internet. It also shares the cellular internet connection out over an RJ45 port and Wi-Fi. SKU: OCO-002 Price: $495.00 ea + GST

Capacitive Oil Level Sensor FST700-204 Capacitive Level Sensor for non conductive liquids such as oil and diesel.

The 1000mm probe can be cut to suit tank depth and easily calibrated.

SKU: FSS-232 Price: $449.00 ea + GST

Productive area monitoring

Differential Pressure Transmitter An economical solution for measuring differential pressures in air conditioning.

Features 250Pa range, LCD display and 4-20mA output.

SKU: DBS-5512 Price: $239.95 ea + GST

Pressure Transducer 0 to 10 Bar FST800-211 series IP67 pressure transmitter feature 3-wire, 0 to 5VDC output and ¼” BSP process connection. ±0.3% F.S. accuracy. Other pressure ranges available.

SKU: FSS-1528 Price: $159.00 ea + GST

Differential Temperature Controller with RS-485 THE safety laser scanner PSENscan provides two-dimensional area monitoring with an opening angle of 275 degrees and a protected field range of up to 5.5 metres.

Due to the free configuration of warning fields and protected fields, plus the ability to adapt to structural conditions, the safety laser scanners are suitable for integrating into a large range of applications. Use the safety laser scanners – PSENscan in particular – for stationary and mobile safeguarding as well as access monitoring.

Features of the safety laser scanner PSENscan include that it is easily integrated into the application due to compact housing and free configuration of the protected fields and warning fields; there is simultaneous monitoring of up to three separate zones plus set-up of up to 70 switchable configurations; it has a series connection of up to four scanners in accordance with the master/slave principle; an integrated operator display for receiving information immediately; exchangeable memory to transfer the configuration; it is robust to dust; and it offers simple assembly and alignment of the scanner with the appropriate accessories.

Pilz Australia www.pilz.com/en-AU 1300 723 334

Designed for solar water heating applications, the N321S comes with two NTC-type temperature sensor inputs and one control output and RS485 (Modbus RTU).

SKU: CET-032 Price: $109.95 ea + GST

For Wholesale prices Contact Ocean Controls Ph: (03) 9782 5882 oceancontrols.com.au Prices are subjected to change without notice.

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 www.pacetoday.com.au 49

WASTEWATER

Improving flow measurement accuracy with flow conditioners One way to reduce plant operating costs is to measure liquid and gas flow more accurately. It goes back to the truism – “You can’t control what you don’t measure”. PACE explains.

T

he first step in measuring liquid and flow accurately is to analyse the different media and flow instruments in place, with an eye toward those affecting the costliest processes. Plant managers need to prioritise the search by potential cost impact to achieve the best return on investment.

Some common critical measurement applications are necessary for efficient operations and include pump protection, plant gases distribution, fluid additive/injection monitoring, compressed-air consumption, boiler fuel gas and air optimisation, tank blanketing, analyser flow assurance, stack gas monitoring (CEMS, QAL1, MCERTS) and flare gas measurement. Poor measurement accuracy in these applications can be expensive. The next step is to audit the efficiency of the flow instruments that are performing these critical measurements.

Start by considering which flow measurements are the most critical to efficiently process throughput and the quality of the end product. what is being primarily measured?

Gases or steam? Which media is the most expensive to generate and move through the plant?

Once critical processes have been identified and the costs prioritised, look at the flow meters and switches already in place. If the plant moves liquids, gases and steam, several different flow sensing technologies may be installed. Once the types of flow meters and switches in place are determined, decide whether they need to be replaced due to their age.

Also check to see if there are enough devices in place to do the job.

Before making decisions about

upgrading flow instruments, operators should think about implementing flow conditioners to enhance existing instruments.

One of the leading causes of inaccurate flow measurement is asymmetrical, or distorted, flow conditions in the upstream and downstream pipe runs from the flow meter or switch. Commonly known as swirl in the pipe, this condition “confuses” many flow sensors because their accuracy depends on a steadystate uniform flow regime.

For example, several types of flow meters can be affected by swirl and asymmetrical flow conditions inside the pipe. Depending on the technology, these meter sensing technologies require a minimum of 6-10 upstream and up to 5 downstream straight pipe diameters for accurate measurement.

Unfortunately, most process industry plants are rich with bulky equipment, which makes installing the required pipe straight runs needed for accurate flow measurement difficult. Often, plant upgrades and retrofits require adding more flow meters in locations that are difficult to accommodate without flow conditioning devices because of their straight-run pipe requirements.

Flow conditioners reduce straight pipe diameter requirements and can correct the flow profile distortions caused by upstream flow disturbances.

These unpredictable flow profile variations are neutralised by a flow conditioner, which creates a consistent and predictable outlet flow profile to the flow meter.

The process requirements, especially the viscosity of the process media, will likely shorten the list of potential candidates when selecting a flow conditioner.

50 www.pacetoday.com.au OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017

Often, plant upgrades and retrofits require adding more flow meters in locations that are difficult to accommodate.

“Before making decisions about upgrading flow instruments, operators should think about implementing flow conditioners to enhance existing instruments” Four different flow conditioner designs can accommodate many process requirements: • The insertion sleeve-style is the most cost-effective version. It can be installed directly into existing pipe or specially designed to meet unique piping configurations.

• The meter run-style, tab-flow conditioner offers pipe section replacement for new and existing piping systems. It is a sevenpipe diameter, long-spool piece comprised of three-pipe diameters of flow conditioning internals and a built-in downstream settling chamber.

• The short run-style, tab-type

flow conditioner offers a simple flow conditioning pipe section replacement for new and existing piping systems. It is a three-pipe diameter, long-flow conditioning spool piece with just the tab flow conditioning internals.

• The elbow-style, tab-type conditioner is a 90-degree long radius elbow. It offers flow conditioning elbow replacement for new and existing piping systems. It can isolate irregular velocity profiles and swirl normally like that encountered in a single elbow, and it can isolate irregular velocity profiles entering the flow conditioner. PACE

STAY CONNECTED

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Low-cost level measurement.

Radar sensor for water management.

Reliable level measurement in water treatment facilities, pump stations and rain overflow basins.

Open channel flow measurement and water level monitoring.

VEGAPULS WL S 61 ▪ Measuring range up to 8 m

▪ Can be used outdoors without restriction ▪ Flood-proof IP 68 housing

▪ Operation via Bluetooth with Smartphone, tablet or PC

Further information: www.vega.com/wls61

Phone 1800 817 135