A well designed, specified and built control system should deliver on this and provide years of service, however Control systems can be overlooked when considering the maintenance of a plant, and typically in shorter timeframes than other plant equipment the components can become obsolete, meaning one failure could result in total shutdown of a plant, and where there is no direct replacement or back up of the software or logic, this can result in serious financial implications.
The relentless march of technology provides us with the ability to achieve tighter control tolerances, higher reliability and improved acquisition of data which can bring tangible improvements to plant operation through higher uptime of the equipment, and cost reductions in running the plant through increased efficiency.
