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Expansion for process control training

A Business Industrial Network product story

Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team Sep 19, 2006

Business Industrial Network has expanded its relationship with Control Station in response to the industry's growing need for process control training services.

Business Industrial Network has expanded its relationship with Control Station in response to the industry's growing need for process control training services.

Continuing education is the primary way for instrument technicians, engineers, maintenance and other industrial personnel to keep up with the evolving technology.

Business Industrial Network and Control Station have agreed to immediately expand the number and geographic reach of their combined industrial training services to address this market need, starting with the Atlanta training location.

These process control training services apply a hands-on approach to training production workers on proven techniques for analysing and optimising process control systems.

This process control training has immediate application value for the industry, enabling them to reduce energy consumption, increase production throughput, and maintain higher levels of quality control.

With such improvements, manufacturers can regain their competitive stature in an increasingly competitive global marketplace as well as well as strengthen for the upcoming industry wide skill shortage.

The disturbing fact is that many recent graduates feel short-changed when they learn how critical process control is to their job effectiveness, and how little they understand about it from their undergraduate education.

In his recent article "Skills shortage", Dan Sussman noted that "a lack of training, both in schools and on the job, have resulted in a severe shortage of skilled manufacturing employees".

Don Fitchett, President of Business Industrial Network adds: "As the baby boomers retire, organisations will lose much of the knowledge and industrial skills those employees gained over the years".

"This process and control training meets our objectives of counter-acting the negative effects by replacing what was once a 'feeling' for the process, with an exact science and knowledge".

Comments from the University of Texas' Thomas Edgar support Control Station and BIN95's plan to expand the scope of their process control training solutions.

In the February 2006 edition of Control Engineering Magazine, Edgar wrote: "The disturbing fact is that many recent graduates feel short-changed when they learn how critical process control is to their job effectiveness, and how little they understand about it from their undergraduate education".

At most production facilities, university-trained production staff possess engineering degrees from disciplines ranging from mechanical and electrical to chemical and aeronautical.

However, process control is only taught as part of a chemical engineering curriculum at most universities, leaving a critical gap in the training of most staff.

"The need for a better-skilled domestic workforce has been documented, and we are responding with industrial training services that make a positive impact", commented Dennis Nash, Control Station President.

"Through our partnership with BIN95 we are equipping production workers with proven techniques for improving control rather than distracting them with theoretical concepts that have little to no application value".

"Training workers to accurately diagnose underperforming control systems and to consistently implement corrective actions are the objectives of our training".

Training workshops delivered through the partnership will be based on Control Station's portfolio of hands-on Practical Process Control workshops.

Workshops will focus on the real-world application of proven techniques for improving the performance of PID controllers and for optimising overall plant performance.

Practical Process Control was originally developed to support the training needs of academics before being introduced to industry in the early 1990s.

Today, Control Station's curriculum is applied in training the next generation of process control professionals at over 100 colleges and universities worldwide.

Leading companies such as Chevron, Holcim, Honeywell, and Lafarge also look to Control Station for enhancing the skills of production staff through training.

Scheduled throughout 2006 and 2007, workshops will be hosted at the Microsoft Building next to Business Industrial Network's headquarters in St Louis, Missouri and at their Stone Mountain training location in Atlanta, Georgia.