High availability and reliability are network keys

ABB has selected T-208 industrial Ethernet switches to connect the network for the new safety and automation system at the Nyhamna onshore gas processing plant.

Westermo Data Communication T-208 industrial Ethernet switches feature 1us time synchronisation and 30ms reconfiguration time.

These two functions are key reasons why ABB has selected them to connect the Ethernet network for the new safety and automation system at the Nyhamna onshore gas processing plant.

The Nyhamna plant is to process natural gas from the Ormen Lange field situated in the North Sea just off the coast of Norway and some 900m below the sea's surface.

Ormen Lange will be the second largest gas field on the Norwegian continental shelf and will be a major new source for the UK and Europe beginning in 2007.

ABB is to provide a safety and automation system (SAS) and a process information and management system (PIMS) to help control and improve the flow of compressed gas through the world's longest (1200km) subsea export pipeline from the Nyhamna plant to Easington in the UK.

Both systems will operate on a Westermo Ethernet network.

All the software and hardware used to monitor the processing plant are connected over a fibre optic linked Ethernet network.

This includes 2000 equipment asset monitors, an OLE for Process Control (OPC) interface to third party systems such as SAP, metering, vibration monitoring and valve monitoring systems, as well as applications for daily operation, maintenance and planning (shift report, long time trending, production plan, safety overview and environmental reports).

ABB will also deliver three pipeline protection systems for Nyhamna, the Sleipner offshore platform and the Easington gas reception centre.

Their purpose is to protect the pipeline against too much pressure.

Gas production and transportation often takes place in very harsh conditions, but the Nyhamna project is seen as the most challenging of the decade.

All the management information for processing the 70 million standard cubic metres of gas per day (more than 800m3/s) will be handled by a robust Ethernet network including 150 time synchronisation and redundancy ring industrial Ethernet switches from Westermo.

"For this kind of application, high availability and reliability of the data management system is necessary".

"Westermo was the first industrial Ethernet switch vendor that was 800xA certified for external clock synchronisation".

"In order to avoid conflict risk and considering factors like the harsh environment, strong capabilities and multi redundant functionalities, we choose Westermo switches".

"The competitive price was also a key deciding factor", said Stig Andheim, ABB Project Manager.

The ABB systems rely on their own 800xA open control system, which consists of both software and hardware.

The software is loaded in the AC800M (part of the 800xA system) controllers and the operator part of the system is loaded onto servers and work stations (clients).

The controllers, servers and clients are then connected together on several network levels, eg a controller network and server/client network, via Westermo switches.

About 150 Westermo T-208 and R-208 switches are implemented in total.

The Westermo Data Communication T-208 industrial Ethernet switch incorporates Network Time Protocol/Simple Network Time Protocol (NTP/SNTP).

This allows SNTP packets to be time stamped.

A pioneer in this technology, Westermo provides outstanding accuracy of 1us or better.

In industrial automation, Ethernet networks have always been limited by the latency jitter of data packet transmission inside the switches.

Depending on the network load, data packet size and the number of switches between the server and the client, data transmission inside an Ethernet switch introduces time latency jitter of up to several milliseconds.

A packet that enters the switch first can even go out after one that arrives later due to switch QoS techniques.

Furthermore, a network with several off-the-shelf switches will accumulate time synchronisation errors for each switch on the network path between the time server and time client.

Precise data analysis needed for process automation then becomes impossible (multi-axle synchronisation in assembly machines, for instance).

With the Nyhamna plant's 150 switches, this feature is critical.

Westermo T-208 switches allow events to be time stamped with high accuracy precision providing a full and exact history of data events.

Sophisticated or critical industrial processes, be they in real time or not, can now be managed with the off-the-shelf SNTP Ethernet protocol.

The R-208 switch is designed to enable industrial Ethernet networks to be installed in a multiple redundant ring configuration.

Those rings also have the possibility to be redundant themselves.

This eliminates network failure caused by either fibre or copper backbone failure.

"We selected Westermo switches because of their clock synchronisation functionality and specifically for the external time synchronisation with the GPS receiver".

"In this kind of application, a very high reliability of all network-transmitted information is needed".

"Full time traceability of data that is transmitted via the switch is then provided".

"With the universal GPS time, we ensure that all equipment works with the same time reference", said Andheim.

Gas production is set to start in October 2007.

Back to top