Beckhoff Automation and EPLAN recently hosted a successful Process 4.0 Breakfast Seminar Series, the first 4th Industrial Revolution seminar in South Africa for process industries. Around 350 people from all main industry sectors (oil and gas, water and wastewater, food and beverage, mining and metals, plastics, pharmaceuticals, pulp and paper etc.) attended across the four venues: Durban, Cape Town, Sasolburg and Johannesburg to learn about Process 4.0 – the next generation of process automation.
Team Beckhoff (SA) with Benjamin Bruns (back right).
Beckhoff process industry expert and product specialist, Benjamin Bruns from Germany took delegates through global explosion-proof certification requirements, integration of HART devices through FDT/DTM into PC-based control systems, ultra-thin integration of intrinsically safe field devices, multi-touch control panels and panel PCs for hazardous locations, as well as big data analytics and remote data access in the cloud.
Johan Reyneke (L) and Rupert Pfaffeneder from EPLAN.
EPLAN expert Rupert Pfaffeneder from Austria covered the full scope of Innovative Engineering Methods with EPLAN Preplanning. In this detailed overview, he demonstrated how the initial planning objectives regarding technical aspects in the engineering process can be realised much earlier using the EPLAN platform. He also showed how EPLAN Preplanning P&ID lays the basis for continuous engineering, from the first rough sketch of a machine or process to detailed P&ID, and how basic process, loop and consumer data, together with instrumentation requirements, are stored directly in a common project database and made available to all downstream engineering phases.
Deemed a success from both Beckhoff and EPLAN, it is envisaged that this seminar will become a biennial event.
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