Remote Tank Farm

Problems

Company purchased an oil lease from a previous operator, only to discover that the existing SCADA system was not included in the purchase price! A new SCADA system had to be created from scratch with the following requirements:

• HMI - cross-platform, web-based
• Trends - real-time and historical trends, configurable by operators
• Security - allow managers to add and remove users and assign roles
• Alarms - alarm notification, with escalation for unacknowledged alarms
• Database - archive historical and alarm data into a database
• Remote Access - secure, remote access, so operators could view plant data remotely

Solutions

• Installed Ignition 7.5, which runs on Windows, Linux, OS X, Android, and iOS
• Created real-time and historical trend screens with a 'tag picker', which allows operators to trend whatever tags they want
• Configured the security model so it is accessible from within the HMI, allowing managers to:
  • Create and delete users
  • Assign security roles to users
• Created alarm notification pipelines which allowed for:
  • SMS (text) messages to operator phones
  • Alarm escalation when an alarm was not acknowledged
  • Email messages from a web-based email server
  • User-defined operator schedules and rosters
  • A means for managers to modify the schedules and rosters from within the HMI
• Created a MySQL database to archive historical and alarm data. Piped the data from the OPC-UA communication driver directly into the database with the Ignition SQL Bridge module
• Installed a Dell SonicWall firewall and configured a virtual private network (VPN) so operators could connect to the Ignition gateway with their company laptops from off-site

Results

• Increased product quality.
• More productive employees.
• More reliable equipment.
• Better able to document environmental compliance.

---

Details

Client: Amrich Energy, Inc.
Location: Santa Maria, CA

PLCs:

• (1) Automation Direct P3-550 (provided by others)
• 48 discrete, 16 analog

HMIs:

• (1) SCADA node - Ignition 7.5
• 120 tagnames

Networking and Remote Access:

• Cellular modem - Internet access
• Wi-Fi - non-secured access to the Internet
• Firewall - restricted access to plant PLC and HMI
• VPN - secure hole through the firewall for remote monitoring of PLC and HMI

Remote Alarming:

• Ignition (email, text messages)

Data Historian:

• SQL Bridge Module (Ignition-to-MySQL)

Other Components Integrated through SCADA:

• Automation Direct - managed Ethernet switch
• AdTran - T-1 modem
• Dell SonicWall - firewall
• Moxa - protocol converter
• NuFlo - flow meter (Modbus RTU)
• Pepwave - cellular modem
• Unico - variable speed drive (Modbus TCP)

Networking, Protocols, and Drivers:

• Modbus RTU
• Modbus TCP
• TCP/IP
• EIA-568A
• RS-485
• OPC-UA (Ignition OPC communication driver)