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The Ridgway, PA Water Treatment Plant replaced
its outdated controls with Emerson's Ovation® expert control
technology. At the customer's request, Emerson utilized the
exiting cabinets to house the HMI for the new control system.
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AUSTIN,
TEXAS (June 13, 2005) — For the 18 months of operation
since replacing outdated controls with Ovation® expert control
technology from Emerson Process Management, the Ridgway, Pennsylvania,
Water Treatment Plant is experiencing measurable improvements
in plant efficiencies. Improvements attributed to the new control
system include:
- Reduced Costs: Replacing several outdated, non-supported
systems with one unified platform significantly reduced plant
costs by decreasing spare parts expenditures and time spent pursuing
multiple vendors for support. New, reliable components have also
reduced plant downtime, which had been frequently required to
replace components of the old systems.
- Improved Communication: Important information from
the Ovation SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition)
remote terminal unit (RTU) is readily available to the control
system and desktops of Ridgway supervisors and managers enabling
faster and more effective decision-making. Operators who previously
spent a total of 2 hours per day manually checking reservoir
water levels can now dedicate that time to focusing on improving
plant processes and water quality.
- Increased Operational Efficiency: Ovation has greatly
increased the efficiency of many Ridgway operations. One example
is improvements to the extremely sensitive and complex backwashing
system, a cyclic process in which filters are periodically washed
out to remove sediment. With Ovation, Ridgway now utilizes only
15,000 gallons of water, versus approximately 20,000 gallons
previously required. This translates into a 25 percent reduction
in water and chemical usage during each backwash process.
- Enhanced Reporting: Prior to installation of the
Ovation system, important plant data was collected and compiled
manually from each separate control system. Now, Ovation provides
approximately 90 percent of the information required to complete
EPA reports. Additionally, improved efficiency of plant operations
provides more accurate plant information for reporting.
Obsolescence,
Unreliability Spurs Move to Ovation
To
truly appreciate how far Ridgway has come, it is helpful to take
a closer look at the circumstances surrounding the selection
and installation of the Ovation system.
In the early 1990s, the
borough purchased several separate systems from multiple vendors
to control its water treatment and five-bay filtration processes.
Over the years, technology obsolescence issues led to difficulties
in obtaining support and spare parts for all the systems. At
one point, the existing systems completely failed, leaving
Ridgway employees to manually operate the plant for several months.
Working under an aggressive project schedule that spanned
just five months from placement of the order to bringing the
system online, Ridgway replaced an outdated Aquatrol plant control
system and PLC-based filtration control system with Ovation control
technology. Ovation, from Emerson’s Power & Water Solutions
industry center, incorporates the latest technologies while also
providing the best product evolution approach so that customers
can efficiently and economically take advantage of leading technologies
over the life cycle of their plant.
Emerson supplied a redundant
network, redundant controllers, a SCADA server, laptop PCs, operator
stations and RTU for the plant, which supplies water to approximately
8,000 people in the borough and township of Ridgway, Pennsylvania.
The Ovation system provides continuous monitoring and control
of the overall plant, as well as its five-bay filtration system.
All told, Emerson’s Ovation
system monitors and controls roughly 770 I/O points. The Ovation
SCADA server, located in the plant’s main building, maintains
constant communications with the RTU unit at Laurel Mill, the
primary reservoir for the water system.
Ovation controllers,
also located in the main building, communicate to I/O modules
located in the filtration building for executing control strategies
for the plant’s filtration system and
all other non-filtration processes. The SCADA server is comprised
of three main components: an Ovation real-time data interface to
move process data between the network and the RTU, a redundant
interface for failsafe communications and a polling engine for
communication between the SCADA server and the RTU.
The SCADA server
supports operations and engineering functions, as well as Emerson’s
Web Viewer connectivity software. This allows Ridgway plant personnel
to remotely monitor and troubleshoot the plant’s control
system from wherever the laptop PCs are located, without traveling
throughout the plant’s service
area.
"We looked at different vendors and different systems,
and we were impressed by Emerson’s technology – we
knew it would serve us not only today, but into the future,” said
Ray Imhof, operations engineer for the borough of Ridgway.
The
Trickle-Down Effect
Although the project is small in
scope from a strictly I/O point of view, it is significant in
that it demonstrates how the operational and economic advantages
made possible by a state-of-the-art control system are within
reach of municipalities of all sizes.
Some of the largest cities
in the country – including Detroit,
San Diego and Sacramento – rely on Ovation technology.
According to Doug Johnson, water industries development director
for Emerson Process Management , municipalities serving smaller
populations, such as Ridgway, also are interested in exploring
how Emerson’s
Ovation system goes far beyond the basic definition of process
control to ensure cleaner, safer water supplies, reduce environmental
hazards and deliver significant operational cost savings.
"Over
the last few years, the water and wastewater industries have
become more aware of the control options available to them. As
a result, more municipalities are moving beyond PLC-based control
to more sophisticated and robust distributed control technologies,
like Ovation,” explained Johnson.
About
Emerson Process Management
Emerson Process Management (www.emersonprocess.com),
an Emerson business, is a leader in helping businesses automate
their production, processing and distribution in the power, water
and wastewater treatment, chemical, oil and gas, refining, pulp
and paper, food and beverage, pharmaceutical, and other industries.
Emerson's Power & Water
Solutions division (www.emersonprocess-powerwater.com)
is a global supplier of advanced distributed process control
and information systems. The Pittsburgh-based company is a recognized
leader in developing plant-wide process control solutions for
the power generation, water treatment and wastewater treatment
industries. Power & Water
Solutions plays a key role in the Emerson mission of combining
superior products and technology with industry-specific engineering,
consulting, project management and maintenance services. Emerson
brands include PlantWeb® , Ovation®, SmartProcess®,
Fisher® , Micro Motion® , Rosemount®,
Daniel®, DeltaV™, and AMS™Suite.
About
Emerson
Emerson (NYSE: EMR), based in St. Louis, is a global
leader in bringing technology and engineering together to provide
innovative solutions to customers through its network power,
process management, industrial automation, climate technologies,
and appliance and tools businesses. Sales in fiscal 2004
were $15.6 billion. For more information, visit www.GoToEmerson.com.
# # #
Ovation, SureService, SmartProcess, PlantWeb,
Fisher, Micro Motion, Rosemount, Daniel, AMS™ Suite and DeltaV™ are
marks of Emerson Process Management. Other marks are the property
of their respective owners.
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