InSinkErator, a division of Emerson Electric Co., is the world’s largest manufacturer of food waste disposers and instant hot water dispensers. As part of their continuous improvement efforts, InSinkErator was looking for a way to increase their productivity and efficiency. They decided to improve efficiency within their existing buildings and identified the need to provide management with visualization of manufacturing problem areas. By closely monitoring and analyzing overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) and Key Performance Indicators (KPI), InSinkErator could implement improvements to its production processes.

Mondi Packaging Paper Štětí a.s. is a leading producer of industrial packaging and paper materials. The company operates a large production plant in the Czech Republic, which receives 1000 tons of timber daily and produces 1,500 tons of pulp and paper each day. The plant, which is the largest ICONICS Web application in Europe, has over 100 buildings and employs over 1000 people. The company needed a robust and efficient system to handle the enormous amount of data generated by the plant and to provide real-time visualization of the plant’s operations.

The Museum of Krapina Neanderthals, located in northern Croatia, required a solution to integrate and automate its building management systems, security systems, and multimedia systems. The museum, which is technologically oriented and extraordinarily equipped for multimedia presentations, needed a system that could handle data acquisition and aggregation, analysis and alarming, visualization, and real-time status of installations and components. The challenge was to harmoniously integrate, coordinate, and automate these diverse subsystems, which included computers, projectors, MPEG players, audio, video and scenting equipment, electrical branch circuits and lighting, metal curtains, HVAC, Siemens fire system, and Honeywell intrusion system.

The Ondrej Nepela Stadium ice rink in Bratislava, Slovakia, is one of the world’s most modern ice hockey facilities. However, the old Building Management System, installed by SAUTER for Ondrej Nepela, was unable to keep up with the needs of the ice rink. The arena needed a system that could monitor and control the air handling system (HVAC) including fan coils, VAV boxes and a heat exchange station, rink cooling technology, Emax Management System, and skylights. The system also needed to be able to handle nearly 4,000 data points and execute over a hundred defined schedules.

Ontario Power, one of North America’s largest power generators, planned to upgrade its generating stations over the next few years. The generating station being modernized had a production capacity of 240MW and comprised of one main computer supervising 8 generators including plant services equipment. There were 10 local control stations one for each unit, running on industrial type computers. The project had unique requirements, necessitating the use of the new OPC driver for “data mining” in the Unified Tag Browser within GENESIS32, which allows database write and read connections using standard SCADA graphics to a Microsoft database.

The Pentagon, the world's largest office building complex, houses over 23,000 employees and is the headquarters for the United States Department of Defense operations. The building is undergoing a renovation project that includes systems for HVAC, fire, security, lighting, IT/Telco critical monitoring, water systems, and hazardous agent monitoring. The challenge was to design a system that could monitor and access all these systems from a main screen in three operator actions or less. The system needed to be able to access any system, on any floor, in any one of the Pentagon’s five wedges, and from any one of the Pentagon’s five rings.

Permskaya Gres, a thermal electric power plant in Russia, was facing a challenge of synchronizing real-time OPC information from several different information systems. These systems worked independently, had different hardware and software platforms, and were placed far from each other. The goal of the project was to increase the control efficiency and capacity for all power stations, which they called the “Planned Capacity Trend functionality”. The main purpose of the application was to provide information from different power generating control systems and delivering the information in real time to remote users.

Preciosa Ornela, a.s., a division of the Preciosa Group, is a specialized glass company involved with metallurgical production, glassmaking, and the manufacturing of raw materials for jewelry. The company required an update to their existing 32-bit HMI/SCADA software involved with the monitoring of temperatures, electrical parameters, and combustion ratio glass sets as part of their production processes. The company was happy with its existing GENESIS32 installation but wanted to add the multiple modern features included in newer 64-bit software. After evaluating offerings from multiple vendors, Preciosa Ornela decided to remain an ICONICS customer and chose GENESIS64.

Rome Metro S.p.A. (Met.Ro.) operates the Metropolitan Rome rail and surface bus lines within the city of Rome, Italy. They also manage some regional bus lines. The organization oversees two main metro rail lines with a total of 53 stations and is currently constructing a third line with 34 additional stations. Each line is approximately 22 km in length. The challenge was to monitor and control the metro line from a centralized location and provide alarm notification for the coordination of emergency actions. The system needed to centralize security monitoring and provide the status of auxiliary equipment at each of the remote stations on the rail line. The auxiliary equipment being monitored included ventilation systems, fire systems, moving stairs, elevators, normal and emergency lighting systems, uninterrupted power supplies, inverters, etc.

VEC Technology required an HMI/SCADA solution coupled with data bridging/reporting/archiving that can be used over the Web, can integrate with the OPC communications protocol and can directly interface with the company’s product databases. They required the solution to control and monitor the company’s patented closed molding operations. They wanted a system that could manage various parameters based on several criteria, including the specific product being produced, ambient conditions and material properties. Also necessary was the ability to provide long term storage of multiple key parameters for product warranty information. The company sought a product with future-proof technology. They also looked for a solution that presented a simple user interface for making edits, as well as an easily maintained Web-based client/server architecture. VEC Technology aimed for a “single vendor” approach, intending to reduce both the number of automation interfaces as well as extra support staff to maintain various systems.

Volgogradoblgaz OJSC, a company that transports natural gas from gas pipelines to the population as well as to industrial and municipal enterprises, was looking to modernize their facilities with cutting-edge Oil & Gas technology. The company's existing system, TraceMode, was outdated and not able to meet the company's needs. The harsh climate and weather in Volgograd also posed challenges to regular maintenance. The company needed a solution that could improve energy efficiency and overall plant manageability.

United Biscuits, specifically their McVitie’s brand, was looking to automate their biscuit baking process. The challenge was to translate the intelligence of more than 30 years of experience into an automatic, high-performance process control system that was user-friendly and could be retrofitted on the existing equipment. The control of the oven, which produces thousands of biscuits per hour, was previously governed by an operator with many years of experience. The knowledge of this operator was documented and formulated into a set of rules for adjusting the oven control based on the quality of the biscuits exiting the oven.

Thermo Systems is a leader in the design and installation of mission critical PLC-based control systems. They specialize in the automation of validated pharmaceutical HVAC systems, utility systems, and validated manufacturing applications. However, the controls market has changed over the past few years, creating an ever-growing demand for open, standardized, and reliable software systems. Thermo Systems needed a software solution that could meet these demands, provide a wide range of programs and features, and comply with the latest FDA regulations.

Tefal SAS, a subsidiary of Groupe SEB, is a global leader in small household equipment. The company manufactures around 44 million products annually in a high energy-consuming process. The energy costs for manufacturing operations could reach as high as eight million euros, split between four million for electricity costs and four million for gas. Given these numbers, Tefal decided to launch an Energy Efficiency project to reduce manufacturing-related energy costs. The company began the project by making an energy diagnosis, in order to learn real-time consumption levels towards the goal of making improvements leading to energy-related savings. Tefal sought an energy management system that could be implemented without revising their existing architecture. They aimed to connect the new system to equipment already in place, using standard communication protocols such as OPC, for use of real-time data in addition to archiving and recovery.

STSI - Integrated Technical Services, located in Zagreb, Croatia, is involved with engineering, maintenance, research and production projects within the Croatian oil, gas and petroleum products industry. The company is part of the INA Group, which is a joint stock company owned by the Hungarian oil company MOL, the Republic of Croatia and private and institutional shareholders. The company decided that the datacenter in its Zagreb headquarters was becoming out-of-date and made plans for its replacement. The new datacenter was designed to include a backup power supply, air conditioning units and a soon-to-be-installed diesel generator. The company sought a SCADA system that would monitor and control crucial parameters such as power supply, temperature/humidity, AC status/mode, UPS status/mode, branch circuit current, individual circuit breaker status, raised floor conditions, technical security, and PLC status.

Solebury School, a coed, college preparatory, boarding and day school for 220 students in grades 7-12, was seeking an automation solution for energy management as well as for centralized control, operation, and maintenance of various systems including HVAC. The school approached Vortechs Automation of Huntingdon Valley, PA for the project. The engineers at Vortechs Automation conducted a survey of the campus and were confident they could help Solebury School save on energy costs through the automation of its existing heating and cooling systems. The specific targets were the school’s science and math building, gymnasium, boy’s dormitory, and maintenance facility.

Simsmart, a provider of process systems design software, process performance analysis, process training solutions, and related application engineering, was looking for a solution to enhance its training system. The company wanted to emulate local control panels with control functions, duplicate machinery control system operator pages, and create a multidiscipline process simulation tool and lesson plan management system. The challenge was to create a training environment that closely mimics real-life situations, allowing trainees to be more 'hands-on' while remaining in a secure learning environment. The system also needed to allow instructors to introduce intentional failures into the training scenario and immediately measure trainee response in as realistic a manner as possible.

SC «ATS» works with multiple plants in the Russian oil and gas industry. The company was involved in providing control systems in three locations: OAO Surgutneftegaz, with more than 40 objects; NK Rosneft, with more than 20 objects; and TNK BP (Tumenneftegaz), with more than 10 objects. The multiple objects to control at each plant make use of a wide variety of technologies, including radio, GSM/GPRS, Wi-Fi and Ethernet connectivity. In total, there are approximately 16 distributed control stations on area objects and about 118 on telemechanical systems. The types of connected devices include multiple controllers, flowmeters and heater controllers from B&R and Siemens, which are connected to ICONICS HMI/ SCADA interface via OPC servers.

AFV Beltrame S.p.A. was in search of an HMI/ SCADA solution to better visualize and control processes within its multiple plant locations. These processes included lowering pollution within fusion furnaces, cooling, stocking, and the insertion of iron alloys in silos. Each plant had its own graphical interface, settings, and alarm requirements. In addition to a robust system for the set-up, monitoring, and control of its plants, AFV Beltrame S.p.A. required a solution that was easy and fast to develop and deploy. The selected system would need to easily handle several thousand tags and I/O points, working with existing Allen Bradley PLCs. An additional need was the integration with the company’s existing Microsoft SQL Server installation.

The Meir Tunnel, a 284 meter long road tunnel located on the A50, a major trunk road in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England, was in need of an upgrade to its Tunnel Control System (TCS) and SCADA system. The tunnel, which is heavily used and strategically important, is operated by Kier Highways on behalf of Highways England. The tunnel is served by an unmanned Tunnel Service Building (TSB) and is controlled and monitored from the main control room located in Coventry. In March 2015, Kier identified the need to upgrade their incumbent SCADA system, future proof their asset management prerequisites and drive engineering response time efficiencies. The challenge was to upgrade the system while returning the tunnel to service every day.

The Oceanium at Diergaarde Blijdorp Zoo in Rotterdam, Netherlands, houses a variety of marine life, including sharks, tropical fish, corals, king penguins, sea lions, and polar bears. To maintain a safe and healthy environment for these animals, the Oceanium's water is regularly refreshed. This process requires large filter installations that are controlled by multiple Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs). The PLCs ensure that the water is pumped exactly where it needs to be and that the filter systems function flawlessly. However, the Oceanium's older PLCs had reached end-of-life and needed to be replaced. Along with the new PLCs, the Oceanium also recognized the need for a new Human-Machine Interface/Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (HMI/SCADA) installation to visualize the data from these connected systems.

In early 2018, the operators of the Austria Center Vienna were considering their building control options, paying particular attention to the building’s security, lighting, blinds, heating, and ventilation. The ACV, working with system integrator TGA, decided upon ICONICS GENESIS64 building automation software, which is BACnet Advanced Workstation (AWS) certified. GENESIS64 was installed on two of the ACV’s servers, with the second server in cold standby. Five clients currently access the server software, which is set up in a virtual environment. There, 15,000 data points are processed, of which about 7,000 are active data points. All devices are now switched via BACnet. For the monthly consumption evaluations, 100 energy meters with M-Bus (Meter-Bus; used for remote reading of gas or electricity meters) are additionally provided for energy-relevant evaluations via a BACnet gateway.

As the Port of Koper began expanding both the number and capabilities of its terminals, the port’s management knew it needed to consider updating its control software. In addition to container and vehicle cargo, the port required additional control of equipment such as conveyor belts and scales for items such as iron ore and coal. As far back as 2004, the port management began to look into how to best scale the control of its operations. At that time, each individual terminal contained its own control solution. The decision was made to work with system integrator, Robotina, which had worked with the port on other projects and had earned a reputation as a reliable partner.

Zentrum für Psychiatrie Südwürttemberg (ZfP) is a large service provider in its region, operating specialist clinics, outpatient departments, and medical care centers. It also works with almost 650 home-based locations, more than 200 outpatient assisted living facilities, an outpatient nursing service, and almost 600 sheltered workplaces/workshops for the disabled. The center considers a high building standard as enormously important to guarantee the appropriate patient environment for the best possible treatment and care. However, for the group’s 157 buildings, this objective can only be achieved with the most modern and technologically advanced building control technology. The prior building management software solution, with approximately 15,000 data points, as well as 500 overview and plant displays, eventually failed to live up to the expectations of the Administration and its multiple locations. The obsolete system was unable to process the required large amounts of data as desired. Data analysis was often delayed and would not show the current state of the building’s environmental conditions. Updates of the existing software were not possible, and development felt frozen in regard to HTML5 programming. These attributes frequently led to emergency staff meetings.

Microsoft's 500-acre headquarters was operating with a disparate network of sensors from different eras, leading to inefficiencies and high energy costs. The company was considering a $60 million investment to turn the campus into a smart campus. However, a team of engineers proposed a different solution. They suggested creating a data-driven software solution that could unify the different systems and provide valuable insights into the buildings' operations. The challenge was to integrate the incongruent network of sensors and enable them to communicate with each other, providing a wealth of data to building managers.