Emerson Exchange 365

by Walt Boyes

A Whirlwind Tour of all the 'Shiny New Stuff' on Display at Emerson Exchange

“It’s nice to get the business update from Steve Sonnenberg,” quipped Peter Zornio, chief strategic officer for Emerson Process Management, “but as engineers, we say ‘show us the technology!'”  

Zornio, who followed Emerson president Sonnenberg's opening keynote to the Emerson Global Users Exchange 2013, divided his time on stage between the themes of Technology Everywhere, Shiny New Stuff, and The Future.

“So, fasten your seatbelts!” he said, and turned on the technology firehose.

Zornio began by explaining that the company had re-organized its product and services offering, grouping them into functional areas including Measure and Analyze, Operate and Manage, Final Control and Regulate, and Solve and Support. "This is a new way for us to present our products and services, and is reflected in how the Technology Exhibits are organized,” he said.

Starting with the realm of Measure and Analyze, Zornio described a new and substantially different ELITE Coriolis mass flowmeter family, as well as new viscosity and density meters. Also new is a polymer-housed version of the 3051 pressure transmitter that is natively wireless and boasts a five-year calibration cycle.

He introduced a new quad-sensor vortex meter for safety instrumented system (SIS) applications that provides a process variable output as well as three voting safety outputs. In magmeters, there’s a new abrasion-resistant, high-temperature lining that Emerson calls Adiprene. There are new temperature transmitters, as well as a wireless guided wave radar transmitter. Zornio pointed to the effect of Emerson's human-centered design in making all of these products easier to use.

He introduced next-generation process analyzers, too, including the Rosemount Analytical Model 1066, a two-wire device with either HART or Foundation Fieldbus outputs. A new oxygen analyzer and multi-path ultrasonic flowmeter for LNG applications also were unveiled. Roxar, Emerson Process Management’s subsea instrumentation business, has introduced a third-generation multiphase meter as well as new Reservoir Management software. Incus is a new ultrasonic gas leak detection system that "listens for leaks and senses them before they become critical,” Zornio said.

In the area of Operate and Manage, Zornio revealed a new Distributed-RTU SCADA product that allows easy, drag-and-drop configuration of control strategies across multiple remote terminal units (RTUs). Version 12 of AMS Device Manager with new asset classes is shipping. “And we have partnered with Beamex and Meridum so that we can have very smooth data transfer and workflow capabilities from the field to maintenance,” he said.

In Batch and Operations Management, Zornio noted several enhancements including improved operator integration and the increased ability to prevent unauthorized changes. He pointed to improved electronic logbooks and recipe authoring tools, especially applicable for the life sciences industries. Going back to the oil and gas industry, he showed off Emerson Process Management’s new Terminal Management and Logistics software.

The latest iteration of the CSI Machinery Health Monitor is now the CSI 2140 Machinery Health Analyzer, Zornio reported. This portable, tablet-sized, four-channel unit is equipped with Bluetooth and 802.11 wireless. "It has benefited greatly from human-centered design in its navigation and HMI,” Zornio said.

For Final Control and Regulation, Zornio introduced an electric level loop for upstream applications including an easyDrive electric valve and L2e electric liquid level controller. He also showed the new 1098-63EGR Regulator, which he said is "zero bleed, very green, and great for oil and gas applications.” To deal with fugitive emissions, he showed the latest high performance ENVIRO-SEAL packings. Further, he noted that ValveLink software now works on the company's 475 communicators.

In the area of Solve and Support, Zornio singled out some of the packaged applications that Emerson has developed, such as Asset Monitoring for Cooling Towers and Asset Monitoring for Compressors.

Of course, Zornio couldn’t leave products without talking about wireless. He introduced the new 1552WU wireless gateway which combines a WirelessHART gateway with a 5GHz WiFi backhaul. And finally, he introduced the latest version of the company's network management software, Smart Wireless Navigator, which enables operators to see wireless network status and health in real time.

Zornio's comments about the future revolved around the changes that what he called “Pervasive Sensing” will bring to the process plant. “We will have more real-time data for business critical information, just as we do today for process critical information,” he said. “You will see probably double the field sensors that you use today, and you will need the tools to manage that data and turn it into information.”

This couldn’t happen in the past, he said, because of the cost, but with lower cost wireless sensors, it was now doable to have many more sensors, and not just process monitoring sensors, either. The new Incus wide-area gas leak detector and the Rosemount 708 Wireless Acoustic Sensor for monitoring steam trap health are two examples of measurement data gathered for other purposes than process control. Ultimately, all this information will be brought together in an Integrated Operations center (iOPS), where the operator of the future will be a business operator, not just a process operator—using a business operations network that is largely wireless to monitor and manage actionable information.