Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
We are seeing unprecidented demand in the industry, and the challenges faced for DCS
migration. I wanted to just have a roundtable discussion
about the state of the industry and what you all are seeing.
There's chemical, oil & gas, food and beverage. They are really hitting a point that they
are going to have to make some decisions. It's not a thing they can put off anymore.
They don't have the knowledge of these systems to really make a good decision on how to migrate.
Or if they should migrate. We've got another 10 to 15 years at most,
and everything needs to be off these systems. One year you're having 125,000 dollars in
new parts cost to the next year being 250, to the next year being 500,000.
At 500,000 dollars, they are a fourth of the year in.
Some of these facilities have 15,000, and they are busy keeping their facility running
not trying to upgrade. Specializations or customizations within the
current systems you have to make you more efficient.
That may not come through as part of the technological advance.
Ignoring those control boxes and thinking more about the process.
That goes hand in hand with the evaluation of the hardware and the software.
The longer you wait, the more it's going to cost.
I'm talking about the financial side. How do you fund it.
It's not all at once. It's a phase investment.
Feeding the elephant one bite at a time. They see all that in front of them so that
they have enough information to say go and spend this amount of money.
They just aren't going to write the check. Lets talk a little bit about DCS platforms
versus PLC's. Assume the solution before you begin the process.
If the PLC solution won't work, or the DCS solution is the only thing that will work.
This has been done on many systems many times. Hard cutovers on major refineries, major plants,
and they haven't been down in 40 years. They are really determining the destiny of
your business moving forward. This is your one shot for the next 20 years
to set pricing. What it's going to cost you to run your control
system. This really isn't technology, it's a business
decision. For a company, do they want to move forward,
do they want to be flexible, do they want to be here 20 or 30 years from now and to
be able to respond to the needs of their customers.