Emerson Exchange 365

by Dave Perkon

Emerson’s Plantweb Insight applications build on the company’s Pervasive Sensing and Secure First Mile offerings, and help users instantly make sense of plant data to drive overall enterprise profitability. “It’s a single, lightweight, easy-to-install web-based platform that automatically and strategically interprets plant data through a scalable suite of applications,” said Melissa Stiegler, director, wireless product management, Emerson Automation Solutions, in a Tuesday morning press release at the Emerson Global Users Exchange in Austin, Texas.

"About 18 months ago I spent time talking with customers about what wireless product they wanted Emerson to develop next," said Stiegler. "What I heard repeatedly was not that they wanted a new product, but that they wanted help with their data. They had tons and tons of it, but didn’t know what to do with it, no one to look at it.”

From this need sprang Plantweb Insight applications, which are designed to support customers’ operational excellence programs in key performance areas such as reliability, safety, production, and energy and emissions management. Using Plantweb Insight, users can improve asset reliability and energy usage by identifying abnormal situations and inefficiencies, recognizing optimum maintenance times, and tracking asset health to identify and prevent failures before they occur. They also can avoid potential safety incidents and ensure regulatory compliance, reducing fines and environmental impact though the real-time identification of leaks and other hazards.

The power of Plantweb Insight resides in its collection of easy-to-deploy applications, each containing the embedded domain expertise and analytics that enable existing resources to immediately identify and resolve asset issues that historically were addressed by periodic, manual rounds or unexpected failures. These applications are designed to help users realize the most from Pervasive Sensing strategies at their sites.

More than a dozen total applications are scheduled for release, with each dedicated to a single, specific asset class. The first three applications are available now and future applications will be released at a rate of two per quarter.

Steam Trap Insight

Steam Trap Insight instantly identifies steam trap failures using wireless acoustic transmitters to remotely monitor steam traps, even in hard-to-reach locations. Up-to-the minute visibility of all steam traps allows manual rounds to be eliminated and dramatically reduces energy waste.

Steam trap leaks can account for 5 to10 percent of total energy costs for a plant. In steam systems that have not been maintained for three to five years, as many as 15 to 30 percent of installed steam traps may have failed without maintenance personnel being aware. Plants employing Steam Trap Insight are estimated to achieve an annual savings of a half-million dollars and a return on investment in just seven months.

Pump Insight

Pump Insight provides predictive health monitoring aimed at identifying and diagnosing the underlying problems that lead to pump deterioration and failure. Through monitoring and analyzation of temperature, vibration, efficiency, pressure and deviation data, wireless, real-time insight into cavitation and pump health is generated and visually provided to plant personnel.

This early detection of potential pump failures enables corrective measures to be enacted before plant performance is adversely impacted or safety and environmental issues occur, potentially saving time, money and lives. Analysis of a 250,000 barrel-per-day refinery shows plants using Pump Insight can achieve more than a half-million dollars in annual savings, with an estimated return on investment in 11 months.

Pressure Gauge Insight

Working in tandem with Emerson’s Rosemount Wireless Pressure Gauge, this application visually delivers safer and more reliable readings, enabling remote collection of field data as frequently as once per minute. Accurate, wireless readings keep operators updated on changing field conditions remotely – reducing manual operator rounds and improving safety by keeping personnel out of hazardous areas and safeguarding against catastrophic events.

The gauge itself – the industry’s first WirelessHART pressure gauge – utilizes field-proven piezoresistive sensor technology to deliver reliable pressure readings. It provides up to 150 times overpressure protection compared to traditional gauges and two layers of process isolation for a safer field environment. The gauge, which has a 10-year life, also reduces maintenance costs and time by eliminating common weak points found in mechanical gauges through the removal of components that inhibit the device from displaying pressure.