SCADA system to monitor, control, pipeline pumping station data

By Control Engineering Staff August 15, 2006

Foxboro, MA— A supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system installed at CHS Inc. will integrate existing third-party programmable logic controllers (PLCs) and monitor and control data from 15 pumping stations along two refinery pipelines. Communications among the stations will be made over a wide-area network (WAN) using fiber optic, VSAT, and dial-up links.

The InFusion -based SCADA system for Front Range Pipeline LLC and Cenex Pipeline LLC is being installed by Invensys . The pipelines transport crude oil to the CHS refinery in Laurel, MT, and refined products to the east, including eastern Montana and North Dakota. InFusion View is providing the graphical HMI for operator visualization in the main control center near Laurel and at each pumping station. InFusion Access and Historian will collect and monitor real-time pipeline data from a wide range of devices at the stations and provide an interface to a centralized third-party historian package for long-term data storage.

The Invensys liquid pipeline SCADA system replaces two existing systems, including a legacy Invensys system. The new installation is said to provide a more flexible, easier-to-deploy, standards-based data acquisition and business decision support platform that can adapt to changes in asset configuration and in the pipeline market.

CHS Inc. is an energy, grains, and foods company providing products and services globally. It operates petroleum refineries and pipelines, and a network that markets and distributes Cenex energy products and renewable fuels.

—Control Engineering Daily News Desk

Jeanine Katzel , senior editor