Issue Archive

Andrew Bond Scopes Out the European User Conferences
Read Andrew Bond’s Industrial Automation Insider, a Monthly Newsletter Covering the Important Industrial Automation News and Issues as Seen from the U.K.

APC and Wireless Rabbits

American Manufacturing Can Bail Us Out
Without Enabling the Companies Below $500 Million, the American and Global Economic Recovery Is Simply Not Possible

Bubba and the Bus
The Rule of 20: If You Select a Tech at Random from a Group of 20, Can He or She Fix the Problem in 20 Minutes?

Does DCS Have a Future?
We Asked Systems Integrators and Vendors What Distributed Control Systems Are and We Got Answers. Is It HMI/SCADA?

Every Day Changes
Looking at Three Technologies That Have Matured In Recent years—Distributed Control Systems (DCSs), Control Software and Process Analyzers

Effect on the M&A Market and Controls Transactions
Economists Expect Unemployment Rate to Increase Even More in 2009

Evolution
Process Control Software Expands to Meet Today’s Evolving Needs

Gas Blanketing Controls and How to Contribute to IEH v.5
A Process Engineer Has Concerns About the Standard Split-Range Nitrogen Blanketing on a Vessel Done with a DCS PID Controller with Separate Analog Outputs to Each Valve. If Everything Is Properly Sized and Tuned, There Should Not Be Any Issues, Right?

Level Measurements Under Water? Balluff Has the Answer
Balluff Introduces SMARTLevel Capacitive Sensors

Living in Uncertain Times
Panic Makes for Bad Long-Term Decisions. Stay Focused on Core Values and Do Not Lose Operating Discipline

Not So Fast on Single-Loop Control
Predicting That Single-Loop Control Will (or Should) Go the Way of the Dinosaur

Power Quality and Conditioning Info
This Month We Study Power Quality and Conditioning Applications

The Evolution of the Process Control Engineer
We’ve Come a Long Way from the Days When Refinery Operators Used Flaming Arrows to Relight Their Flare Systems, but Even Bigger Changes May Be Ahead

Something Old, Something New
Users of the Two Most Measured and Most Important Variables in Process Control—Temperature and Pressure—Are Benefiting from Added Intelligence, Software and Other New Technologies, but Everything Still Depends on Good Old-Fashioned Sensors and Well-Maintained Thermocouples and Resistance ...

Sorting Out ATEX
You Need to Know Where ATEX-Certified Products Must Be Used in Your Plants

The Best Gift
For Kids, Connecting with the Larger World, Including Its Technology and Engineering, Means First Connecting with the People Closest to Them

The One Machine
What Is the Value of a Telecommunications Network

Top 50 – Who’s on YOUR Playlist?
Control and ARC Advisory Group Show You Who’s Hot and Who’s Not on the Automation Hit Parade

It Looks Like Up to Me…
The Process Industries Will Be Among the Least Affected of the Industrial Verticals by the Global Economic Meltdown

The Wireless Hype in Process Automation
With Fuzzy Logic All of the Control Problems of the World Were to Be Easily Solved, Along with World Hunger, AIDS and Environmental Pollution.

Energy Sectors Boost Instrument Sales
Gains in Oil and Gas, Refining, Utilities and Pharma Keep Instrumentation and Automation Numbers Good through 2010

First Field Device Verified via HART 7
HART 7 Technology Provides an Upgrade and Migration Path to WirelessHART Communication

Cooper Industries Opens Industrial Technology Center
Cooper Industries Celebrated the Grand Opening of the Cooper Technology Center

Berra moves up to chairman at Emerson Process Management
New Chairman at Emerson Process Management

Wireless dominates Honeywell’s Berlin party despite ISA100 ballot’s best efforts to rain on its parade
European Honeywell Users Group

Systems merge but “we won’t leave anyone behind”
Jean-Marie Alliet’s Technology Update

ISA100 – two steps forward or one step back?
ISA100.11a Draft Standard Progresses

What do you really need an MES for?
MES-like modules available within Copa-Data’s zenon SCADA package include the Industrial Performance Analyzer and the Industrial Maintenance Manager

Bhattacharya sees shift from supply chain to plant
Supply Chains Are Leaner. There Is a Need to Connect Directly into the Plant

Schneider brings Citect field operations in–house
Integrating Citect SCADA and MES Software

Vendors’ figures give few hints of trouble ahead
Analysts Look into the Future and Determine Which Automation Companies Will Survive the CUrrent Financial Turmoil

New Foundation Fieldbus white paper
Foundation Fieldbus Safety Instrumented Functions Forge the Future of Process Safety