As industrial plants look to digital transformation to take their operations to the next level, industrial wireless becomes a key enabler. It’s hard to imagine a smart, digitalized facility not leveraging wireless technology because the cost of laying cables can be enormous.
A key consideration is that wireless designed for enterprise environments doesn’t necessarily have the capabilities required to run reliably in an industrial environment. Industrial environments face unique challenges and conditions, including dense infrastructure and hazardous environments. Overcoming these challenges requires a different approach.
This is where the collaboration between market leaders Cisco in IT solutions for enterprise networking and Emerson in OT solutions comes in. Together, we create wireless access solutions designed for the toughest industrial environments, helping customers improve productivity, safety, and security.
Our newest joint solution combines the Emerson Wireless 1410S Gateway with the Cisco Catalyst IW6300 Heavy Duty Series Wi-Fi Access Point, enabling facilities to create a robust, secure wireless infrastructure from the two leading IT and OT providers.
Oil and gas customer example
As an example, an oil and gas customer realized they needed to understand the correlations among people, processes, and asset data. Understanding those correlations required the installation of wireless infrastructure–such as Wi-Fi and WirelessHART–across the refinery. These technologies are often deployed in industrial environments to connect mobile devices, access points, and sensors on plant floors and in control rooms.
◉ Corrosion monitoring
◉ Vibration monitoring of rotating equipment
◉ Acoustic monitoring of steam traps and pressure relief valves (PRVs)
◉ Performance monitoring of heat exchangers and cooling towers
In addition, the customer deployed wireless technology to:
◉ Support plant employees and operators while performing their physical rounds and duties
◉ Collect and analyze data to improve operational performance
◉ Backhaul reliability and monitoring data independent of the control system
As result, the installed Cisco and Emerson joint solution provides:
◉ Wireless connectivity across the plant, eliminating the need to collect information manually
◉ Instant visibility into data from devices monitoring the most critical assets for operators on the plant floor
◉ The ability to quickly assess the health of those critical assets, greatly improving operator productivity
Operators and control room engineers now focus more on value-added tasks because they need less time to:
◉ Communicate with the control room to deal with antiquated processes
◉ Collect and analyze data to improve operational performance
Integrating security
Security is obviously a pressing topic for all IT and OT professionals. To help improve the security posture of the joint Cisco and Emerson solutions, Emerson is integrating with Cisco SecureX. This integrates the Cisco Secure portfolio with the Cisco and Emerson infrastructure, speeding detection, response, and recovery.
If you’d like to improve worker productivity, security and operational excellence around your industrial set of use cases, consider leveraging the investment Cisco and Emerson have made to help you digitally transform your industrial environment, improve worker productivity, and build operational excellence.
Source: cisco.com
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