Internet of Things comes of age

In the automation industry the Internet of Things (IoT) is slowly growing as industry increasingly takes advantage of technologies that interpret data from, for example, SCADA, supervisory HMI, MES and EMI solutions on a single platform. At Advantech's IoT conference in July 2012, Mike Lees business manager of HardwarePT, the Industrial IT division of SolutionsPT explained more

While it's certainly true that the IoT is much more readily associated with the consumer electronics IT sectors, it offers multiple benefits to the manufacturing and automation industries. It represents the next huge leap in automation, particularly where there is an advantage to be derived from acquisition and organisation of previously unthinkable amounts of data.

This quantity of information, which in the IT world we would call big data, could be defined as a data set or sets so large and complex that they become awkward to work with using existing management tools.

Part of the potential of the IoT is unleashing this data, sometimes through physical mash-ups of real world, physical services and cloud data, so that it can be effectively analysed. Sherlock Holmes was the first to comment that: "It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts."

This is true in applications, such as process optimisation, where we used to be restricted to collecting just a few data points, limited by simple serial networks and the negligible storage capacity of the control devices, something which was especially true of PLC based control. Adoption of plant historians, generally based on Microsoft SQL server, represented the next step towards the ability to manage the required quantity of data. The final stride was removal of the communications bottleneck that legacy internet access represented and the introduction of cloud based storage. There is still a challenge in distributed architectures, such as those often found in the utilities sector, where communications support is normally provided by wireless networking and, historically, connectivity has not been great. Nevertheless, in factory automation the IoT will supplement the Ethernet backbone, connecting devices and assets that were not practically able to access fixed networking. SAP defines the Internet of Things as, 'a world where physical objects are seamlessly integrated into the information network, and where the physical objects can become active participants in business processes. Services are available to interact with these smart objects over the Internet, query and change their state and any information associated with them, taking into account security and privacy issues.'

The bottom structure of IoT comprises sensors, networks, services, and applications. SolutionsPT, for example, provides sensing products to acquire the front-end data, thanks to its partnership with Advantech. After convergence and processing, data is sent to the service layer via the network. Ultimately, the database will be used in various fields with different strategies. SolutionsPT offers SCADA, historian and operational intelligence systems for the service layer to manage the status of sensing devices, as well as the interpretation platforms through which all of this data can be managed.

In a temperature controlled distillation column, for example, as the hot hydrocarbons rise, they cool to the point where they liquefy and can be drawn off as one or another petroleum product. The use of inexpensive wireless temperature sensors in large quantities along the length of a distillation column will provide a huge amount of data for the operator that may never have been available before. It can be used for process bottleneck discovery and process optimisation. This process optimisation data is enabled by the concepts of the IoT.

In a discrete manufacturing plant, consider the value of having parts selfidentify with RFID tags, and automatically controlled rolling bins and forklifts moving parts and subsystems around without human intervention - and always getting the right part to the right place at the right time. Consider too the value of having all that information available in easily accessible databases wherever needed.

Now consider environmental monitoring and the value inherent in having intelligent air, water and solid waste pollution sensors connected to the manufacturing control system, so that repair and remediation are automatically triggered if values go beyond set points.

The IoT means a commitment to the value of data as a management tool. It can be about gathering data without knowing how it will ultimately be used. Like the similarity between thin client and mainframe and cloud and virtualisation, this is a new concept founded on an old one.

Another driver for the IoT is the changing demographics of manufacturing IT. New engineers have a culture of implementing solutions that give a scope of creativity and use in a way that was not initially envisaged. For instance, there is a willingness to model all the things in the manufacturing world and make it easy to remix them in new ways to build new applications, which is a key characteristic of the IoT.

This trend is part of a wider process of integrating the world of consumer electronics and enterprise IT much more closely into the traditionally conservative manufacturing environment. Manufacturing is characterised by a set of qualities that are different from those in enterprise IT. For example, hardware has an extended service life, often being used for over a decade, compared to three or four years in the enterprise world. One reason for this is that updates are harder to apply due to the need for validated systems in many applications. Continuity of supply is a constant requirement; downtime a constant fear.