EXHIBITIONS
with digital components. “Due to the continuing digitalisation we hope for a clear rise in demand for what we offer, for efficient electrohydraulic valve drives,” explains Geigle, from Hoerbiger. “Who today wants to equip process plants, power plants or pipelines with advanced automated valves, will certainly increasingly opt for digitalised actuators”. There hardly seem to be any limits for the switch to digital solutions. Compact electrohydraulic drives with a maximum of digitalisation and an extremely wide area of application allow digitalisation of nearly all applications. “The only prerequisite is a source of electricity,” explains Geigle. “This can be realised reliably through solar panels and battery boxes even in the furthest regions, such as sand or ice deserts and the open steppe. There is hardly any limit for the usage of actuators for digitalised valve automation”.
Hardly limits for digitalisation From a technical point of view there probably won’t be any challenges that can’t be solved with appropriate effort. “The limit as such lies in how companies accept it,” emphasises Samson’s Arzbach. What data should be made transparent? Is the data safe enough? The companies need to answer these questions for themselves, “should they want to use digitalisation the whole distance”.
The use – and the outlook – of digitalisation is huge. It “allows control of valves around the clock,” explains Arzbach. Directly measurable values such as set point, actual position and actuator pressure are continuously monitored and in future will be complemented with further data, such as the flow rate. The positioner can indicate possible faults in the valve to users. Messages such as “inner leakage” or “defect actuator spring” require no further interpretation by the user. Together with the valve diagnostics integrated in a
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positioner, digitalisation is able to increase plant availability, as possible faults can be made out and repaired at an early stage. Arzbach: “It is a future goal, to entirely avoid faults, which can be realised by approaches such as proactive maintenance management. Relevant information and assessment of a valve as an actor in a plant are here not only absolutely necessary, but also a substantial competitive advantage”.
The intelligent factory Digitalisation enables fast, targeted and open communication with automated valves and opens this node in the pipeline system for industry 4.0, i.e. for the intelligent factory. Geigle: “The digitalisation of valve automation will therefore continue to progress. It is a prerequisite for the industry 4.0 and for intelligent and networked systems, which can be predefined to control and optimize themselves to a certain point”.
The real and virtual world are growing together – or with other words: information and communications technologies are merging together with industrial processes. This is reason enough
for Siemens to intensively dedicate itself to industry 4.0. A development leading towards digitalisation as being the decisive driver of growth in nearly all branches of industry. “The digital factory isn’t a vision any longer,” Anton S. Huber, CEO of Siemens Digital Factory business, is certain.
Trend to
individualised products The industry 4.0 will allow to companies meet the trend towards individualised products and increasingly short product life cycles. “The small lot sizes and increased variant diversity require technologies which can continuously adapt to changing requirements,” reports Festo. In the future, components in industrial plants therefore need to be able to coordinate themselves. Intelligent components will automatically organise and configure themselves. They will determine themselves what they require from a plant. This leads to an autonomous decision-making and control on site. As Festo states, what was once a fixed, centralised plant control will become a decentralised operation. This would
for instance allow components to react independently to critical state.
The future has arrived The basis for industry 4.0 is the exchange of data and information in real-time. Without digitalisation, this would be impossible. The development of industry 4.0 and the resulting applications and automation demand a consistent integration into the digital realm. The future for modern valves has long since begun…
Press contact Valve World Expo 2016
Petra Hartmann-Bresgen, M.A. Phone: +49 (0)211 4560-541 Fax: +49 (0)211 4560 87 541 E-Mail: HartmannP@messe-
duesseldorf.de
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