Mobile SCADA monitors power supply for chemicals manufacturer

Engineering mobility specialist Schad is implementing its EXTEND7000 Mobile SCADA system at the international speciality chemicals manufacturer, Allessa Chemie. The company, which runs two production plants in the Rheinland area of Germany, selected EXTEND7000 for its Frankfurt-Fechenheim manufacturing operation. The system was purchased in order to more effectively monitor the consistency of energy distribution levels within its main 400V plant power supply right around the clock, seven days a week.

For Allessa Chemie, changes to power distribution can cause losses to production levels during the manufacturing and compromise health and safety levels. As a result, the ability to have immediate notifications delivered directly into the hands of plant engineers offers important benefits including reduced downtime. In addition, EXTEND7000 has been configured to trigger the use of switching devices and to observe the value of individual bus bars, both of which previously needed to be activated via Allessa Chemie's control room, causing delays to production schedules.

Currently, Schad's mobile SCADA system has been configured to monitor 540 parameters - 400 switch positions and 150 alarms - which are recorded and controlled by a Siemens Simatic S7-400 controller using PCS7 and monitored by its existing WinCC SCADA system from a fixed control room. Now, after implementing EXTEND7000, within seconds of a problem occurring, a notification is sent directly to an appropriate member of the engineering team, which ensures downtime is kept to a minimum.

Allessa Chemie integrated EXTEND7000 with its existing WinCC SCADA system to enable the system to be extended very easily in the future. The company has indicated that one of the most likely additional applications for EXTEND7000 Mobile SCADA will be within its wastewater treatment plant, and plans to implement these shortly.

Mr Klaus Knahl, Head of EMR Operations and responsible for the use of electrical instrumentation and control technology at Allessa Chemie, says: "We are running a large continuous manufacturing operation 24/7 and needed to identify a way to improve the existing fixed monitoring capabilities. EXTEND7000 was the perfect solution and allowed us to continue using our existing SCADA system and simply enhance it to suit a more mobile way of working."

A triple first for Schad

In addition to winning an important new customer, this project also culminated in a triple first achieved by Schad, who recently expanded its operations with an office in London. Firstly a new application area, because the Allessa Chemie implementation marks the first time EXTEND7000 Mobile SCADA has been used to monitor and control an internal power supply within a manufacturing operation. Secondly, it is the first time Schad has integrated its mobile SCADA application to a Siemens S7-PLC via Profibus, which illustrates the flexibility of EXTEND7000 to integrate easily with any PLC or existing SCADA system. Thirdly, after the system successfully went live within just 2 days, this represents the fastest project implementation undertaken by Schad's professional services team to date.

James Hannay, Managing Director at Schad, says: "We believe the team at Allessa Chemie are delighted with their new monitoring capabilities and the speed with which they could introduce mobile working into their existing processes."

For more information on Schad and the EXTEND7000 Mobile SCADA system, visit the website at www.schad-automation.com.