Siemens Gets Michigan Greenfield Contract

BASF’s decision to build a greenfield plant there should provide a boost to Michigan’s beleaguered manufacturing economy.

The large project of more than 5,000 I/O points, scheduled for completion in 2009, will include the Siemens Simatic PCS 7 distributed control system (DCS). It will be the largest Profibus PA installation in the U.S.—more than 3,000 field devices—and one of the world’s largest applications of redundant fieldbus.

As the project MAV, Siemens will help BASF minimize the total cost of ownership at the plant by managing the other automation and control vendors involved in the project to ensure the smooth integration of all components into the system.

“Our MAV and technology evaluation processes were very thorough for this new plant,” says BASF’s project manager Dr. Wulf Beer, “We had to have complete confidence that the MAV will execute the project according to our expectations. The PCS 7 DCS technology, combined with Siemens’ project management capabilities, led to the selection.”

Siemens will supply a fully redundant DCS, including redundant fieldbus connectivity using active field distributors, redundant networks, redundant controllers, redundant HMI servers, clients and redundant batch servers.

 “This award demonstrates the confidence BASF has in Siemens and the capabilities of PCS 7,” said Andreas Aufenanger, general manager, Siemens Process Automation. “We’re very familiar with the BASF application standard and presented an execution strategy that’s in line with the customer’s business objectives.”