Exploration

Honeywell introduces new ways to modernise control rooms

Experion^® Local Control Network will allow customers to seamlessly upgrade legacy TotalPlant™ Solution (TPS) systems

Honeywell Process Solutions (HPS) announced this week, the introduction of its Experion^® Local Control Network (LCN) solution. This new offering enables the incremental upgrade of the company’s legacy TotalPlant™ Solution (TPS) control system to allow for a secure, seamless integration with Experion^® PKS.

With Experion LCN, Honeywell is providing a path for continuous innovation to customers around the world. Industrial facilities can gradually move their legacy control system forward to become part of a new, modern solution while leveraging existing automation assets. HPS made the announcement at its annual Honeywell Users Group symposium taking place this week in The Hague, Netherlands.

Today, users of TPS are dealing with compliance issues related to new safety regulations, as well as with increasing system support challenges. As every industrial organisation is under pressure to reduce costs while improving performance, plants running outdated control systems need to avoid obsolescence by employing the latest automation technology. The Experion LCN solution provides users with standards-based functionality, regulatory support capabilities, and integrated operations from the field through the plant to the business level.

“Honeywell continues to enable customers to take advantage of state-of-the-art technology while protecting and evolving their decades of investments in controls, graphics, and procedures,” said Jason Urso, chief technology officer of HPS. “Industrial operations concerned with updating their TPS system can now seamlessly upgrade to the Experion LCN solution which delivers numerous operational and business benefits in addition to a significant system life extension.”

Honeywell’s on-process incremental upgrade to Experion LCN modernises the control system infrastructure and enables deployment of the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT). Existing control strategies, field terminations, applications, history, and graphics can be retained, allowing users to focus on high-value improvements.

Using Honeywell’s proven Experion Fault Tolerant Ethernet (FTE) infrastructure, the new Experion LCN bridge connects Experion to Classic Coax LCN. Once this connection is established, the LCN coax connection can be removed one LCN node at a time. Instead of a hardware connection for every Experion TPS node, only one redundant Experion LCN bridge pair is needed to enable virtualisation.

Honeywell’s TPS modernisation solution minimizes operating disruptions and maintains overall consistency, as well as delivers significant lifecycle advantages. After modernisation, the control system can have a common Human Machine Interface (HMI) and unified physical control network, enabling control devices to easily integrate/expand with the latest generation of Experion PKS controllers and safety systems. The advanced control solutions and new functions within Experion PKS controllers can additionally improve the effectiveness of plant operations.

Bright future for Ugandan oil and gas sector, says Siemens

The International Monetary Fund recently stated that the oil reserves in Uganda may account for around four percent of the country’s economy annually in the next few years if managed well

These sentiments were echoed by speakers and delegates attending the Uganda International Oil & Gas Summit in Kampala Uganda.

Addressing government officials and delegates, Patrice Laporte, Vice President of Siemens North American Oil & Gas Division, presented a keynote titled ‘Digitalization in the Oil and Gas Sector’.

“As more and more technology per barrel is required, oil and gas projects are becoming increasingly complex and the need for an integrated solution is important,” said Laporte. “The anticipated positive economic impact in Uganda from the oil and gas sector is indeed promising but the full effect of this will only benefit the country and its citizens through judicious planning and implementation of the proposed pipeline.”

Uganda is a new entrant into the oil and gas market. The proposed oil pipeline stretching from Uganda oil fields to the Tanzanian port of Tanga will be the world’s longest electrically heated crude oil pipeline. It is estimated to be one of the most expensive projects to develop upstream, midstream and downstream infrastructure and the country is looking to capitalize on lessons learned in other developing oil and gas markets, as well as from established producers.

“With an estimated 6.5 bn barrels of oil and close to 500 bn cuft of gas, Uganda is a promising site for exploration. Siemens has a proven track record of delivering fit-for-purpose technical solutions on a large scale in remote locations. This expertise and knowledge can play a decisive role in ensuring the performance and on-time delivery of a key infrastructure project of this magnitude,” added Laporte.

Siemens is considered one of the technology leaders in the industry because of its full spectrum solutions, products and services. “For many years Siemens have been supplying industrial automation, power generation and power distribution strengths and experience to the oil and gas industry.”

“What makes this special is that our expertise and technology is not only of benefit at the inception of a project but along the full value chain and throughout the entire lifecycle of an investment. Our innovative technical solutions ensure the sustainability of projects with a key focus on reliability, performance and economic efficiency.”

Siemens involvement in the third Uganda International Oil & Gas Summit follows on the back of its participation at Future Energy Uganda earlier this month as well as the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding in May this year at the World Economic Forum in South Africa.The company is collaborating with Uganda on a number of fronts related to the country’s immediate and long-term energy and infrastructure ambitions as well as actively investigating the best option to establish a local presence based on business sustainability.

Sabine Dall’Omo, Siemens CEO for Southern and Eastern Africa recently commented while in Uganda, “Siemens is a company that invests for the long term and is optimistic about the long-term fundamentals of the Ugandan market. We want to support sustainable development – with solutions and projects in Africa, for Africa and are actively reviewing the requirements for the organization to open an office in Uganda taking into consideration business sustainability.”