LIVE DEMO SHOWS FULL IMPLEMENTATION OF 'TECHNOLOGY WITH A BUSINESS PURPOSE'
19 May 2005 - Fieldbus Foundation

The Lima Press Day demonstrated how FOUNDATION fieldbus H1, High Speed Ethernet and Flexible Function Block technology, integrated with OPC, forms an open, interoperable plant infrastructure for both Brownfield and Greenfield projects, improving process performance and delivering significant Operating Expense and Capital Expense savings.

FOUNDATION fieldbus was specifically developed as an open environment providing the ability to integrate multiple systems, subsystems, applications and devices. The technology provides the 'Freedom to Choose' and the 'Power to Integrate' across the plant enterprise, enabling end-users to choose best-in-class automation solutions that work together seamlessly regardless of their supplier.

The Lima BDO technology demonstration was a joint project initiated by BP Amoco Chemical Company, an indirect subsidiary of BP plc., and the Fieldbus Foundation. ISP, through one of its subsidiaries, acquired BP's BDO operations in March 2005. The Lima plant has an annual capacity of 60,000 metric tons of BDO, a key building block for specialty chemicals products used in pharmaceutical, personal care, food, beverage, coatings, oil field and other applications.

Fieldbus Foundation members participating in the demonstration project included: ABB, Emerson Process Management, Fieldbus Center at Lee College, Hawke, Hirschmann, Honeywell, Invensys, MTL/Relcom, Pepperl+Fuchs, Phoenix Contact, Rockwell Automation, Smar, Softing, StoneL, TopWorx, Turck, Yamatake, Yokogawa and Westlock.

According to John Rezabek, lead controls engineer for the ISP Lima facility, the fieldbus demonstration project provided valuable, real-world experience for end-users seeking to replace proprietary control systems with an open, interoperable fieldbus architecture enabling robust, reliable control at the field level.

'Having implemented the demonstration project in a mission-critical part of an operating process, we feel confident that we have passed a milestone in the development of fieldbus HSE and truly distributed control,' said Rezabek. 'The distinct advantages of implementing H1 and HSE in lieu of proprietary networks will become increasingly apparent, as our leading suppliers develop products to make this technology accessible to their customers everywhere.'

Fieldbus Foundation President and CEO Richard Timoney acknowledged the contributions of all demonstration project participants. 'Thanks to the efforts of leading automation equipment suppliers and end-users, the future of true plantwide distributed control is here today,' said Timoney. 'As seen in the BDO demo application, industrial manufacturers can eliminate the constraints of proprietary legacy systems and realize the benefits of a modern, open, fieldbus-based control environment.'

Developed for the FOUNDATION fieldbus HSE (100 Mbit/s) technology program, but also compatible with H1 (31.25 kbit/s) fieldbus systems, FFBs are a key component of the FOUNDATION architecture for plant wide information integration. FFBs, which are application-specific, bring the full instrumentation integration part of the fieldbus solution into play. They reside at the fieldbus user layer along with standard function blocks and enable control strategies such as supervisory data acquisition, batch control, Programmable Logic Controller sequencing, coordinated drive control and Input/Output interfacing, including gateways to other plant device networks.

The use of FFBs enhances the ability to move control functionality to the field-level. For example, with FFBs running in an HSE linking device, a single physical device can support batch and logic control. With this approach, users can often eliminate the need for proprietary unit controllers. Unlike other solutions requiring a master-slave link, this technology places process node aware logic local to the optimized task.

Two types of FFBs, pre-configured and fully-configured versions, are now available. The Fieldbus Foundation released specifications for the pre-configured FFBs in March 2000. Specifications for the fully-configured FFBs were released in September 2001 after completion of field tests at the Lee College Fieldbus Center in Baytown, Texas, USA.

Pre-configured FFBs have a predefined number/type of I/O parameters like standard function blocks, but the algorithm is configurable. Since the I/O is predefined, the Electronic Device Description is also predefined. The initial FFBs of this type, Multiple Input/Output blocks, have eight analog or discrete parameters per block: MAI, MAO, MDI, MDO. MIO blocks are used for remote I/O interfacing and simple gateway applications.

Fully-configured FFBs are used for more complex applications; they allow both the number/type of I/O parameters and the algorithm to be configured. In this case, the EDD is generated 'on the fly' by the configuration tool. FFBs are created using programming tools based on standards such as IEC 61131-3. Once created, FFBs are instantiated and connected to other blocks just like standard function blocks.

For the live demonstration application in Lima, a FOUNDATION fieldbus system consisting of H1 field devices and HSE linking devices was installed on a vapor system. The fieldbus controls actuated a series of butterfly valves used on the process. The demo highlighted FFB implementation of host-resident logic utilizing both discrete and analog field devices residing on H1, the co-existence of diverse control systems from various manufacturers using HSE, and the interoperability of alternate HSE linking devices and associated controllers. In addition, the demo showed the suitability of existing FOUNDATION fieldbus devices for high-speed batching and sequencing of discrete systems, as well as the use of FFBs in discrete and hybrid applications.

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