SCADA
SCADA systems are used to control and visualise real industrial processes from a computer.
They have many applications: for example, controlling the pumps of an industrial plant, monitoring and controlling the assembly lines of a factory, or controlling the temperatures, pressures and valves of a given process to make a product, among many others.
We work with different platforms, such as Ignition, Siemens WinCC, AVEVA InTouch (Wonderware), Vijeo Citect and iX Developer, all of them well known and widely used in industry today.
All these SCADA systems provide a wide range of solutions. Some of the most common are described below:
• Overview (synoptic) screens and main screens to display data such as machine parameters, actual process temperature values or setpoints entered by the SCADA user.
Overview screens reproduce the physical layout of the application. For example, when an assembly line is controlled, the line is recreated virtually with all the parameters needed to operate it.
• Control of setpoints and parameters through pop-up windows. For example, monitoring and controlling every automatic valve on a production line.
• Historical logging to store all the required values of a SCADA: temperatures, pressures, recipes used to manufacture a product, etc.
• Recording and display of value trends to control processes. For example, time and temperature, time and mass, motor speed or any other parameter can be displayed.
• Data export thanks to historical logging. Data collected in the SCADA can be stored and sent to a database or to spreadsheets.
• User management and access control, to restrict or precisely control which users can operate the SCADA. It is also possible to know when changes were made to the program and who made them.
• Warnings and alarms. Predefined alarms and warnings can be added to know what is happening in the system at all times. For example, high-value alarms in processes that require precise temperature control, or level sensors in a silo that alert the user when the maximum or minimum level is reached.
• Web access to SCADA parameters. Depending on the platform, a web user interface can be designed to give full access to the application from any location and computer. This makes it possible to supervise an industrial plant, a process or a machine without being next to it, with full assurance that it is operating correctly.
Today's SCADA: web-based, scalable and connected
SCADA systems have evolved considerably in recent years. Modern platforms run in the browser, can be accessed from a tablet or a phone and integrate with databases and business systems. At FMJ Ingenieros we are Ignition Gold Certified Integrators (Inductive Automation), and we also work with Siemens WinCC, AVEVA InTouch (Wonderware) and other platforms.
Some of the advantages of a modern SCADA over an older installation:
- Web and mobile access: screens open from any authorised workstation without installing software on each computer.
- Scalability: start with one machine or line and later extend to the whole plant, adding signals, screens and users.
- Built-in Historian: logging data to an SQL database makes it possible to analyse trends, compare batches and produce production or energy consumption reports.
- Alarm management and notifications: alerts by email or message to on-call staff, recording who acknowledged each alarm and when.
- MES and ERP integration: exchange of production orders, recipes and traceability data with business systems.
If your plant runs an old SCADA that is hard to maintain or no longer supported, migration can be done progressively, keeping the existing PLCs and without stopping production. We study each case to propose the most suitable solution.