Money for nothing: Consider replacing DCS now

-- Control Engineering, 7/31/2007

Orlando, FL—There’s no such thing as a free lunch? Oh, but there is, if you consider savings that can add up and pay for investments in aging distributed control system infrastructure, according to a Rockwell Automation control technology replacement expert. And while performing in-kind replacements, as needed and piece by piece, is certainly an option, costs are higher and the savings aren’t as great.

“We need to think harder about how we can migrate customers from legacy distributed control systems to today’s systems,” says Mike Vernak, program manager for Rockwell Automation’s legacy DCS migration solutions program. Reasons for delaying upgrades include unwillingness to shut down production, lack of capital budgets, and an apparent willingness to spend the dollars on maintenance, he says. Vernak told Control Engineering at the company’s recent RSTechEd conference that, in his more than 20 years in process industries, he has seen similar challenges everywhere.

“I ask people how things are operating, what keeps them up at night, and what are the risks associated with unplanned downtime,” Vernak explains. Sometimes one lost batch can cost millions of dollars. Also part of the conversation are benefits that can accrue from update systems, such as the latest PC-based controllers, advanced human-machine interfaces, faster information about the process, tighter loop control, and use of advanced algorithms. Upgrades also provide the opportunity to redesign processes more efficiently, and phase a migration, if that’s needed. He said sometimes one unit will get a new DCS, and the removed equipment becomes a parts store for remaining units until capital is available to migrate the rest of the plant.

At the request of Control Engineering, Vernak assembled the table, “Legacy DCS migration cost justification,” to compare some costs of direct part replacement versus purchasing a new system. As if the 10-fold difference in replacement costs weren’t convincing enough, supporting reasons (such as lack of technical support, difficulty in finding parts, and data flow and translation challenges) help make project justification easier. See the table for more.

For other news from the RSTechEd meeting in June, see:
— Software upgrades: Rockwell CPR 9 to ship in October
— Convergence of IT, controls delivers benefits
— Re-target your innovations

—Mark T. Hoske, Control Engineering editor in chief