Plants and process control environments today feature a number of systems to ensure smooth and efficient operation. What if all the information within these disparate systems were integrated into a single holistic system regardless of their source? This is what ABB Ability System 800xA enables.

Organizing Information Beyond Files and Folders

Core to System 800xA is ABB’s Aspect Object Technology. This technology organizes information, not into files and folders, but into aspects of objects.

An object can be a physical object, like a valve, a complex entity, like a reactor, or an immaterial object, like a manufacturing order or production batch. All these objects have different information tied to them. These are known as aspects of the object.

One Click, Endless Insights: Streamlining User Experience

By bringing multiple libraries of object types and their aspects into one collaborative environment, users simply right-click an object to reveal information relevant to them.

The Aspect Object Technology within System 800xA enables enhanced collaboration and decision making, increased efficiencies, ease of scalability, and is therefore inherently more secure.

To get the most out of your OPC A&E data, you need secure, convenient and reliable access to it. This white paper explains how a good OPC A&E integration solution can provide networking, aggregation, redundancy, and conversion of the OPC A&E protocol itself.

Networking

OPC A&E uses DCOM for networking, which is difficult to configure and troubleshoot.  Instead, tunnel/mirror software can connect OPC A&E clients and servers over a network, avoiding DCOM altogether. Done right, a tunnel/mirror system can make secure outbound connections from behind plant firewalls, keeping all inbound firewall ports closed, and also supporting connections through proxy servers and DMZs.

Protocol Conversion

A&E information is valuable in some systems that don’t support the A&E protocol, such as reporting packages and SCADA systems. Software that can do data conversions across a unified namespace can bring the value of alarm and event data to systems beyond the immediate context of an A&E client.

Aggregation

As demand grows for remote monitoring of alarms and events in complex systems, it helps to consolidate incoming OPC A&E data streams. Aggregating A&E data reduces network traffic and frees up bandwidth. Software that provides a unified namespace can collect A&E data from all sources and retransmit it to all connected clients.

Redundancy

Adding redundancy for A&E connections in mission-critical systems significantly improves the chances of alarms being received and acted upon. A redundancy broker monitors two identical connections and switches from one to the other whenever one data stream dops, allowing the client to continue uninterrupted.

Industry 4.0 is creating demand for plant data of all kinds. OPC A&E is often needed by analysts and upper management for large-scale planning and efficiency initiatives. This white paper explains how you can get the most out of OPC A&E data by aggregating it into a unified namespace and sending it across redundant networks to where it is most needed.

While the pos­sib­il­it­ies of AI-based im­age pro­cessing are fas­cin­at­ing, ques­tions re­main in many com­pan­ies about how they can im­ple­ment in their ex­ist­ing ap­plic­a­tions. How ex­actly the tech­no­logy works and how to get it up and run­ning in your own ap­plic­a­tion still raises un­cer­tain­ties and shows gaps in know­ledge in nu­mer­ous in­dus­tries. Man­u­fac­tur­ers of in­tel­li­gent AI sys­tems and cam­er­as are provid­ing an­swers by sim­pli­fy­ing the use of AI-based em­bed­ded vis­ion sys­tems, among oth­er things. IDS NXT is an ex­ample - this com­plete smart AI sys­tem opens the door to the ef­fort­less use of AI-based im­age pro­cessing not only for ex­perts, but also for cit­izen de­velopers. This makes in­teg­ra­tion in­to ap­plic­a­tions not only easi­er, but also quick­er too.

De­tect­ing, sort­ing, count­ing, veri­fy­ing com­plete­ness

AI-based im­age pro­cessing has the abil­ity to clas­si­fy im­ages in­to dif­fer­ent cat­egor­ies - this is very help­ful when it comes to de­tect­ing and clas­si­fy­ing products. This makes it pos­sible to auto­mate many tasks that are still all too of­ten done by hu­mans. This in­cludes identi­fy­ing de­fects, sort­ing ob­jects on con­vey­or belts and com­plete­ness checks. In par­tic­u­lar, their abil­ity to re­cog­nize com­plex pat­terns and struc­tures in im­ages makes them an im­port­ant tool in qual­ity as­sur­ance. This is be­cause these are usu­ally very dif­fi­cult to de­tect with the hu­man eye.

Feas­ib­il­ity stud­ies for do­main ex­perts

Con­sid­er­ing the many op­por­tun­it­ies and chal­lenges in the field of im­age pro­cessing, es­pe­cially when us­ing pre­vi­ously un­known tech­no­lo­gies, tools and meth­ods, car­ry­ing out feas­ib­il­ity stud­ies is be­com­ing in­creas­ingly im­port­ant. On the one hand, they en­able a re­li­able as­sess­ment of feas­ib­il­ity, but also carry the risk of quickly be­com­ing com­plex and cost-in­tens­ive. However, the key skills for work­ing with ma­chine learn­ing meth­ods are no longer the same as for rule-based im­age pro­cessing. The qual­ity of the res­ults is no longer de­term­ined by the product of a manu­ally de­veloped pro­gram code by an im­age pro­cessing ex­pert, but by the learn­ing pro­cess with suit­able sample data. Above all, this re­quires a deep un­der­stand­ing of the re­spect­ive ap­plic­a­tion.

What also re­duces the ef­fort, es­pe­cially for ini­tial ap­plic­a­tion tests, is the fact that with a com­plete AI sys­tem such as IDS NXT, a large part of the de­vel­op­ment and eval­u­ation pro­cess can be man­aged in a simple and in­tu­it­ive cloud ser­vice. In this AI Vis­ion Stu­dio, users do not need to have any ex­per­i­ence in AI, ap­plic­a­tion pro­gram­ming or im­age pro­cessing. This be­ne­fits the very com­plex de­vel­op­ment of em­bed­ded sys­tems in par­tic­u­lar, which pre­vi­ously re­quired spe­cial ex­pert­ise with very spe­cial­ized de­vel­op­ment tools. Un­der these cir­cum­stances, feas­ib­il­ity ana­lyses can then be car­ried out solely by do­main ex­perts who have the most product know­ledge. This means that com­pan­ies are less re­li­ant on pro­gram­mers and im­age pro­cessing ex­perts dur­ing the eval­u­ation phase.

Short train­ing cycles through the strategy of small steps

Once the ini­tial find­ings from the feas­ib­il­ity ana­lys­is tests are avail­able, ad­just­ments can be made to the fur­ther pro­ced­ure in or­der to in­crease the qual­ity and per­form­ance of the AI mod­els. It is im­port­ant to note that a trans­ition to lar­ger data sets may be ne­ces­sary. However, this should be a gradu­al pro­cess to en­sure that mod­els are trained cor­rectly and ro­bustly. A small data set at the be­gin­ning re­duces the risk of over­fit­ting, where the mod­el "mem­or­izes" the train­ing data too much and gen­er­al­izes poorly to new, un­known data. In ad­di­tion, work­ing with less data shortens the train­ing phases and al­lows for faster ex­per­i­ments and it­er­a­tions, al­low­ing you to re­ceive timely feed­back and ad­apt the mod­el or data sets ac­cord­ingly.

User-friendly tools, such as those provided by the AI Vis­ion Stu­dio "IDS light­house" even for in­ex­per­i­enced users, also help to eval­u­ate and eval­u­ate train­ing res­ults with suit­able sample data dir­ectly in the cloud. This means that you lose little time at the start of the project when ex­per­i­ment­ing due to time-con­sum­ing pre­par­a­tion and car­ry­ing out tests on the real ma­chine, es­pe­cially if sev­er­al it­er­a­tions are ne­ces­sary.

Easy in­teg­ra­tion with All-in-One sys­tem

However, even if im­age pro­cessing can be gen­er­ated in­tu­it­ively with the help of user-friendly tools and even new­comers can achieve good res­ults, its seam­less in­teg­ra­tion in­to the cus­tom­er ap­plic­a­tion rep­res­ents an­oth­er sig­ni­fic­ant chal­lenge. This mani­fests it­self in par­tic­u­lar in the in­ter­faces, both at hard­ware and soft­ware level. On the hard­ware side, this in­cludes as­pects such as con­nect­ors, cables, ad­apters and cable lengths to en­sure a seam­less con­nec­tion. On the soft­ware side, in­teg­ra­tion re­volves around is­sues re­lat­ing to trans­mis­sion pro­to­cols, res­ult formats and the seam­less in­teg­ra­tion of the im­age pro­cessing soft­ware in­to the sys­tem's con­trol sys­tem. Soft­ware de­vel­op­ment kits (SDKs) of­ten play a de­cis­ive role here, as they provide the ne­ces­sary tools and re­sources to flex­ibly ad­apt the im­age pro­cessing func­tion­al­ity to ex­ist­ing sys­tem ar­chi­tec­tures. In or­der to mas­ter the vari­ety of pro­gram­ming lan­guages, de­velopers are es­sen­tial.

To en­sure that im­age pro­cessing can be suc­cess­fully and eas­ily in­teg­rated not just as an isol­ated tech­no­logy, but as an in­teg­ral part of the en­tire ap­plic­a­tion pro­cess, the hard­ware and soft­ware as­pects of a user-friendly sys­tem must be con­sidered from a hol­ist­ic per­spect­ive. This is made pos­sible by all-in-one em­bed­ded vis­ion sys­tems such as IDS NXT.

In­tel­li­gent im­age ana­lys­is in a build­ing block sys­tem

The prom­ise that AI-based im­age pro­cessing can be eas­ily used by any­one, even without spe­cial­ist know­ledge of AI or ap­plic­a­tion pro­gram­ming, only works if all com­pon­ents are de­signed simply and com­pre­hens­ively, from im­age ac­quis­i­tion to the trans­mis­sion of ana­lys­is res­ults or the con­trol of a ma­chine. In ad­di­tion to the in­tel­li­gent cam­era hard­ware, IDS NXT also in­cludes the AI data and train­ing plat­form and en­ables in­di­vidu­al ana­lys­is se­quences to be plugged to­geth­er via a block-based visu­al ed­it­or, which are then ex­ecuted as apps on the cam­era at the touch of a but­ton. With per­fectly co­ordin­ated build tools, em­bed­ded vis­ion de­vel­op­ment could hardly be easi­er. With stand­ard­ized in­ter­faces, such as di­git­al in­puts and out­puts, a rest­ful web ser­vice and in­dus­tri­al pro­to­cols such as OPC-UA, sys­tem in­teg­ra­tion of the com­plete sys­tem is as easy as with a smart sensor. Thanks to the app-based sys­tem, the ana­lys­is task can also be con­ver­ted from one product to an­oth­er with­in seconds. This min­im­izes costs for set-up times and makes spe­cif­ic em­bed­ded vis­ion devices eco­nom­ic­ally vi­able even for batch size 1. Simple and hol­ist­ic ac­cess to AI-based meth­ods, as with the ex­ample of IDS NXT, cre­ates more ac­cept­ance for the new tech­no­logy, which means that the know­ledge gaps can fi­nally be closed. 

Au­thor: Dipl.- Ing. (FH) Heiko Seitz, IDS Ima­ging De­vel­op­ment Sys­tems GmbH
 

ADI's strategy has altered as it has de­veloped over the past years and this col­lab­or­a­tion hub shows how im­port­ant the fo­cus to strengthen col­lab­or­at­ive part­ner­ships with the cus­tom­er has be­come. “The cus­tom­ers are tak­ing ADI to the end user - to the con­sumer- to meet every­one’s needs” says Mar­tin Cot­ter Pres­id­ent of ADI EMEA.

With the Cata­lyst™ as an R&D en­vir­on­ment and its test beds stretch­ing about 100,000 square feet ADI is look­ing for co­oper­a­tion and co-cre­ation by cre­at­ing a work en­vir­on­ment where em­ploy­ees of the firm may in­ter­act with their coun­ter­parts from oth­er cli­ents' op­er­a­tions to achieve more fully formed solu­tions with ADI’s ex­pert­ise. 

A treas­ure of know­ledge and in­nov­a­tion

ADI is cur­rently the second-largest pro­du­cer of pat­ents in Ire­land. Ac­cord­ing to Mike Mor­ris­sey, Dir­ect­or of the ADI Cata­lyst, there are about one thou­sand R&D en­gin­eers avail­able in Ire­land to work with. De­vel­op­ing en­gin­eer­ing skills is an im­port­ant ob­ject­ive for ADI’s Lim­er­ick op­er­a­tion. To guar­an­tee the ac­cess to this genu­ine gold­mine of tal­ent and to sup­port the stu­dent ad­mis­sion, it has partnered with the Uni­versity of Lim­er­ick by es­tab­lish­ing and fund­ing an Im­mers­ive Soft­ware En­gin­eer­ing de­gree pro­gram. Stu­dents in this course can fur­ther­more com­plete place­ments at the ADI Cata­lyst fa­cil­ity. 

With this foresight and the com­pany’s ex­pert­ise in the dif­fer­ent do­mains of ana­logue, di­git­al, soft­ware, and AI al­gorithms the man­age­ment of ADI Cata­lyst sees sig­ni­fic­ant de­vel­op­ment po­ten­tial in many key sec­tors. 
In­dus­tri­al in­nov­a­tion for in­dus­tri­al auto­ma­tion 

ADI en­gin­eers col­lab­or­ate on ex­cit­ing projects for a range of in­dus­tries with part­ners like Voda­fone, Mu­nich Elec­tri­fic­a­tion, In­tel Cor­por­a­tion, John­son & John­son, Varjo, and Aus­tri­an Ra­dio. These in­clude bet­ter bat­tery man­age­ment for the next stages of e-mo­bil­ity, sensors and com­mu­nic­a­tion tech­no­lo­gies for the smart fact­ory and In­dus­tri­al IoT, and en­ergy-ef­fi­cient drives for auto­ma­tion tech­no­logy.

The world of semi­con­duct­or is be­com­ing crit­ic­al for every in­dustry 

“The health­care sec­tor is ask­ing for per­son­al­ized solu­tions” says John O’Don­nell, Dir­ect­or of Ap­plied Tech­no­logy De­vel­op­ment at John­son & John­son Ad­vanced Tech­no­logy Centre. Mak­ing auto­mated man­u­fac­tur­ing lines more ver­sat­ile is one of the prob­lems that ADI and John­son & John­son, the phar­ma­ceut­ic­al and health­care brand, are at­tempt­ing to solve at the Cata­lyst. The aging pop­u­la­tion re­quires more solu­tions and lar­ger volumes, so the port­fo­lio is grow­ing. But ac­cess to tal­ent is de­creas­ing. This re­quires the use of auto­ma­tion. Today J&J has their own pro­duc­tion line, but the trend is to be more ded­ic­ated, more flex­ible, more cus­tom­er-ori­ented and more ad­apt­able. They suc­ceeded to im­prove hand­ling high product mix re­quire­ments and make switch­ing between dif­fer­ent stock keep­ing units (SKU) easi­er.

Re­du­cing the en­ergy con­sump­tion of factor­ies' old mo­tor drives, cre­at­ing in­cred­ibly de­tailed di­git­al twins, fos­ter­ing safer in­ter­ac­tions between hu­man cowork­ers and co­bots, and re­du­cing com­mu­nic­a­tion in­fra­struc­ture latency to im­prove sys­tem re­spons­ive­ness are ad­di­tion­al areas of the in­dus­tri­al do­main on which ADI re­search re­sources are be­ing dir­ec­ted. 

Col­lab­or­a­tion on Elec­tric Vehicles

Work­ing with ADI at the Cata­lyst is the Ger­man com­pany Mu­nich Elec­tri­fic­a­tion. Their in­cent­ive is to op­tim­ize bat­tery man­age­ment sys­tem (BMS) ef­fic­acy re­gard­ing elec­tric vehicle (EV) power­trains. ADI is the world's lead­ing pro­vider of BMS sys­tems with more than 17 mil­lion sys­tems shipped. Cur­rently, 16 of the world's top 20 elec­tric vehicle man­u­fac­tur­ers use ADI BMS sys­tems.

A big prob­lem with elec­tric vehicles is that the weight of their wir­ing har­nesses is so great that it sig­ni­fic­antly re­duces their range and there­fore re­quires them to be charged more of­ten. This in­creases the over­all costs sig­ni­fic­antly and re­quires a lot of space in the vehicle. For this reas­on, the two com­pan­ies have col­lab­or­ated on an al­tern­at­ive BMS design that con­tinu­ously and se­curely ex­changes tem­per­at­ure, voltage and cur­rent data res­ult­ing in com­pact bat­ter­ies and EVs with high­er ranges. 
This tech­no­logy is not only in­ter­est­ing for the auto­mot­ive in­dustry, but also for en­ergy stor­age sys­tems. 

“We need to design for the bat­tery, and to bring more in­tel­li­gence in­to the design of bat­ter­ies. Data has be­come the heart of everything, but that data is mov­ing back from the cloud, where it went 10 years ago, to the edge, to be avail­able im­me­di­ately.” sug­gests Sha­lini Palmer, Cor­por­ate Vice Pres­id­ent at ADI EMEA. 

The im­port­ance of in­nov­a­tion can be seen in mo­bile data traffic: im­prov­ing tech­no­logy has re­duced en­ergy con­sump­tion to less than 1%. Oth­er­wise, data would con­sume up to 84% of the en­ergy. In col­lab­or­a­tion with Voda­fone, ADI will de­ploy a private 5G net­work on the as­sets. The mo­bile net­work op­er­at­or is work­ing with ADI en­gin­eers to find ways to re­duce power con­sump­tion of the ra­dio ac­cess com­pon­ent of net­works as the amount of data pro­cessed in­creases dra­mat­ic­ally. 
With the 5G net­work, co­bot con­trol, per­form­ance test­ing, and data col­lec­tion from II­oT nodes will be­come easi­er.

The chal­lenges of our time can only be solved to­geth­er. We need col­lab­or­a­tion ac­cel­er­at­ors like the Cata­lyst in Lim­er­ick: a co-cre­ation space where the feel­ing of be­ing able to work with and learn from each oth­er in a fa­mil­i­ar col­lab­or­at­ive en­vir­on­ment with the skills of ADI tech­no­lo­gies to rap­idly de­vel­op lead­ing solu­tions which trans­lates in­to more hope for our fu­ture. 
 

Kontron has showcased integrated Industry 4.0 and IIoT solutions at the Smart Production Solutions 2023 in Nuremberg from 14 to 16 November. The company shed light on the synergy between hardware, software and the supporting system consulting provided by Kontron as a comprehensive solution portfolio.

Experience IIoT through a live demonstration at the Kontron booth

This year Kontron has displayed an IIoT network in the form of innovatively networked computer systems. As an example, refrigerators are equipped with sensors to record and monitor key parameters in real time. System monitoring and data acquisition are carried out using secured Arm® and x86 systems with the KontronOS operating system in conjunction with the EquipmentCloud® digitalization solution. This allows easy monitoring of machine conditions, maintenance scheduling, software updates or remote access to machines. As an end-to-end solution, this live demonstration impressively illustrated the integration of hardware, software and competent system consulting offered by Kontron.

Update for the Kontron susietec® KontronOS and Connect IoT bundle

The Kontron susietec® toolset enables companies to implement holistic digitalisation solutions. With KontronOS, a secure industrial IoT-to-cloud operating system based on Linux® for networked systems is provided, which is available as standard on Arm® (AL i.MX8M Mini) and Intel® basis (KBox A-250). It provides protection against compromises and external access to the corporate network as well as uncontrolled updates. The automated update process ensures that the system is always up-to-date. Particularly with large device fleets, it makes sure that all devices in the field are at the same update level despite different schedules and threat scenarios.

Also on show at SPS was the new release of the Connect IoT bundle, which offers an extended range of versatile functions for machine manufacturers and operators. The bundle combines the powerful KBox A-250 industrial computer platform with the low-code interface integration solution FabEagle®Connect. The new version 3.1 integrates data interfaces to the SQL databases Firebird, Microsoft SQL, MySQL, Oracle, PostgreSQL as well as SQLite and simplifies the possibilities for edge data processing through C# code components. A filterable message monitor facilitates diagnosis during configuration and operation. From the end of 2023, the cost-optimised KBox A-250 will also be optionally delivered with pre-installed FabEagle®Connect to enable a quick start to network installations.

High-performance industrial PCs for Industrial IoT and AI

Kontron presented industrial computers in box PC format and as rackmount or workstation versions with powerful Intel® Core™ i processors of the 13th generation for computation-intensive applications as well as industrial-grade panel PCs and monitors for demanding control and visualization tasks. The product range for the Smart Factory is made complete by Smart technologies as well as scalable solutions and comprehensive services based on Time Sensitive Networking (TSN) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) for intelligent edge computing, convergent networks and workload consolidation.

Performant motherboards offering a high degree of scalability

The compact K3921-N mSTX motherboard, equipped with powerful Intel® Core™ i3 processors and Intel® N-series processors (Alder Lake N), is "Made in Germany" and impresses with outstanding performance in a handy mini-STX format. This versatile board supports up to three independent displays with 4K resolution and is ideal for use in industrial automation, medicine, digital signage, KIOSK, POS/POI and casino gaming. The matching SMARTCASE™ S501 is also available.

High-Performance Computer-on-Modules: Maximum flexibility for edge applications

Kontron offers the latest 13th generation Intel® Core™ Mobile processors on all COM Express® form factors and the high-performance COM-HPC® client modules. Particularly noteworthy here is the COM Express® mini series as an extremely robust and space-saving platform based on Intel® Core™ technology for the first time. An application-ready package consisting of a COM-HPC server module, board management controller and carrier board enables rapid implementation of the final solution. The right module can be selected for the requirements of the individual IIot application from the wide range of COMs in different performance levels and functionality.

Web Panels for industrial applications

Kontron will be expanding its HMI portfolio with a new web panel series based on Arm® NXP i.MX8M Plus processors. These panels are ideal for device and machine visualization as well as facility automation. They come in a range of display sizes (5'', 7", 10.1" and 15.6") and provide enhanced graphics performance, PoE capability and advanced connectivity. With the help of the integrated QIWI software toolkit, the configuration and parameterization of the device settings and browser properties are simplified significantly. The panels are ideally suited for use in industrial environments and ensure long-term availability as well as first-class technical support.

The UNIFLEX Advanced 1775 (UA1775) cable carrier has been continuously expanded with new sizes and features in recent months. This qualifies the lightweight, quiet all-rounder for a wide range of applications, including in automotive production, gantries & axes, intralogistics, material flow and material handling, cranes and machine tool manufacturing, the timber industry, agricultural machinery and commercial vehicles.

The UA1775 is available with an inner height of 56 mm and in widths between 100 and 400 mm for the designs 020 (closed frame), 030 (with outside opening and detachable crossbars) and 040 (with inside opening and detachable crossbars). The durable cable carrier system impresses with its particularly quiet running and can be used with and without pretension and also unsupported and gliding on long travel lengths. High speeds and accelerations are also possible.

The four-part chain links are designed in such a way that the individual parts require only a minimum of storage volume, simplifying logistics and saving resources. With bending radii between 90 and 340 mm and the short pitch of 77.5 mm, the torsion-resistant design with its sturdy chain body ensures low wear. To protect the environment, TSUBAKI KABELSCHLEPP manufactures this cable carrier with up to 35 % regranulate.

In combination with the latest generation of the space-saving TS3 divider system, this opens up new areas of application, in particular in machine tool manufacturing and for gliding applications on gantries or axes. The TS3 system features a height separation with intermediate plastic partitions, while the narrow end divider on the outer sides ensures space-saving utilization of the space inside the cable carrier. The new divider is used for vertical division within the cable carrier as a standard. The complete divider system can be adjusted in the cross section and can also be used individually as a lockable TS0. The TS1 version with continuous height separation is another variant.

The UA1775 offers fast, easy and simple installation of cables and hoses: The crossbars can be opened and closed quickly – with just two steps in each case. A simple screwdriver is the only tool required. Particularly convenient: The crossbar remains attached to the chain link even when open and can therefore not be lost. If necessary, the crossbar can be released from the chain link with a simple twist.

With the easy-to-assemble design, the cable carrier offers great benefits especially as a ready-to-install TOTALTRAX® system or as an assembly for long travel lengths. In addition to high-flexibility cables, the TSUBAKI KABELSCHLEPP product range also includes guide channels made of aluminum and steel as well as drivers, roof system, condition monitoring components and much more.

Positive Displacement flow measurement devices, such as Titan Enterprises’ Oval Gear (OG) flowmeters, are one of the most widely used types of flow meter for measuring the flow of petroleum liquids and petrochemical additive injection fluids. They remain a solid choice for many applications in today’s modern process control environment, due to the OG’s suitability in harsh environments, high-pressure capability, and long-term reliability with minimum maintenance. They are also ideally suited for viscous fluids.

High viscosity liquids, such as fuels, thick oils, bitumen, resin and tar, require devices that are precision engineered to provide highly accurate flow measurement. The teeth in an oval gear meter are used to drive the gear and seal the central path, with the differential force being developed by the shape of the ovals rather than the gear teeth on the lobe. Oval Gears vary in size and shape depending on the resolution and flow requirement of the process application.

The pressure drop is essentially the limiting factor when it comes to metering high viscosity liquids within an application. The Oval Gears within these flow measurement devices provide a larger surface area generating a much greater driving pressure across the gears. This results in a wider flow range capability and lower pressure drop (see graph below) compared to other positive displacement meter types. 

Neil Hannay, Titan Enterprises’ Senior Development Engineer, says: “The higher the viscosity of a liquid, the more pressure will be required to ‘force’ the liquid into the flowmeter and around the oval gears. It’s important to bear this in mind when selecting the correct size of oval gear flowmeter for your application. For example, more pressure will be required to push through resin than diesel.”

Metering high viscosity liquids

Almost immune from the effects of varying liquid viscosity, density and temperature, the measurement accuracy of  Titans’ Oval Gear (OG) flowmeters improves as liquid viscosity increases, from a nominal 1% to around 0.1% of flow rate at higher viscosities. Titan’s standard OG models provide high accuracy up to 1000 cSt; for viscosities above 1000 cSt Titan’s specially profiled gears are supplied to facilitate additional flow of the liquid.

Titan Enterprises offer special options and adaptive designs of its Oval Gear meters to meet specific high-pressure requirements, aid chemical compatibility, and ensure safe operation in potentially explosive atmospheres. Titan’s Oval Gear range of meters include ATEX compliant IP65/NEMA 4 protection models, and devices that offer intrinsically safe options for processes that operate within harsh environmental conditions, such as explosive or corrosive atmospheres, where flowmeters are required to withstand tough environments whilst maintaining accurate and reliable measurement.

Titan’s Oval Gear meters can be pressure tested in-house up to 950 bar for custom-designed models and calibrated against diesel upon request. In the chemical industry, oval gear flowmeters are often used in conjunction with a batch controller to allow for the automatic dispensing of pre-set volumes of chemicals. 

Resolve Optics is a leading supplier of custom lens assemblies including high-performance Infrared (IR) optics for use in thermal imaging, FT-IR spectroscopy, CO2 laser and defence applications.  

The company delivers thousands of custom lens assemblies per year – from complex high-speed imaging lenses, and material sorting inspection optics, to radiation resistant lenses for critical space and nuclear applications.

Optimising performance in the infrared waveband

Using substrates including germanium, sapphire, silicon or zinc selenide, Resolve Optics is experienced in developing and supplying IR lens assemblies with anti-reflection coatings to optimise performance in the infrared waveband to best suit your application.

Mark Pontin – Managing Director of Resolve Optics commented “While some optical design and manufacture companies promise low cost and high quality, few can match the innovative optical design and expert technical support that Resolve Optics is internationally renowned for. We have successfully developed many innovative and custom optical assemblies for our industry partners over the last 25+ years. We welcome the OEM design and manufacture opportunity to develop, design or manufacture special lenses and optical products”.

The new Optris CSvision is the ideal device for temperature control of the hard-to-access processing of metals.

Infrared pyrometers must meet high demands, especially in metallurgy where smoke, steam, and dust can hinder clear readings. Even in these harsh conditions, our CSvision with Smart Ratio Mode (SRM) delivers stable measurements.

Equipped with built-in video sight, motorized focus, and brightness reduction filter, the CSvision can handle even the toughest applications with ease.The switchable two-stage brightness reduction filter ensures optimum viewing conditions even with very hot and therefore bright objects.

Together with the crosshair laser, which is also standard, this ensures simple sensor alignment under all conditions.
 

Machine Learning (ML) is becoming a standard requirement for embedded designers working to develop or improve a vast array of products. Meeting this need, Microchip Technology has launched a complete, integrated workflow for streamlined ML model development with its new MPLAB® Machine Learning Development Suite. This software toolkit can be utilized across Microchip’s portfolio of microcontrollers (MCUs) and microprocessors (MPUs) to add an ML inference quickly and efficiently. 

“Machine Learning is the new normal for embedded controllers and utilizing it at the edge allows a product to be efficient, more secure and use less power than systems that rely on cloud communication for processing,” said Rodger Richey, VP of Microchip’s Development Systems business unit. “Microchip’s unique, integrated solution is designed for embedded engineers and is the first to support not just 32-bit MCUs and MPUs, but also 8- and 16-bit devices to enable efficient product development.” 

ML uses a set of algorithmic methods to curate patterns from large data sets to enable decision making. It is typically faster, more easily updated and more accurate than manual processing. One example of how this tool will be utilized by Microchip customers is to enable predictive maintenance solutions to accurately forecast potential issues with equipment used in a variety of industrial, manufacturing, consumer and automotive applications. 

Complete solution that can be easily implemented by those with little to no ML programming knowledge

The MPLAB Machine Learning Development Suite helps engineers build highly efficient, small-footprint ML models. Powered by AutoML, the toolkit eliminates many repetitive, tedious and time-consuming model-building tasks including extraction, training, validation and testing. It also provides model optimizations so the memory constraints of MCU and MPUs are respected. 

When used in combination with the MPLAB X Integrated Development Environment (IDE), the new toolkit provides a complete solution that can be easily implemented by those with little to no ML programming knowledge, which can eliminate the cost of hiring data scientists. It is also sophisticated enough for more experienced ML designers to control. 

Microchip also offers the option to bring a model from TensorFlow Lite and use it in any MPLAB Harmony v3 project, a fully integrated embedded software development framework that provides flexible and interoperable software modules to simplify the development of value-added features and reduce a product’s time to market. In addition, the VectorBlox™ Accelerator Software Development Kit (SDK) offers the most power-efficient Convolutional Neural Network (CNN)-based Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning (AI/ML) inference with PolarFire® FPGAs. MPLAB Machine Learning Development Suite provides the tools necessary for designing and optimizing edge products running ML inference.

Essential infrastructure such as irrigation canals, hydroelectric dams, rivers and agricultural farms always need to be monitored to ensure safe and efficient operation.

Currently to do this, there is monitoring technology that utilizes low-power radio. By using long-range wireless communication to monitor activity, it is possible to identify problems as soon as they occur.

The SLR-434M is a compact embedded radio modem, operating in the 434MHz (ISM band). It allows information to be transmitted over long distances in LoRa® mode (approximately 10 kilometers) or operate in conventional FSK mode.

By connecting to an external CPU or PC with UART interface, the user can send data or design simple control systems using Circuit Design's dedicated command protocol for industrial applications. It is also possible to process up to 8 switching signals.

Oriental Motor's BMU Series includes compact, lightweight and powerful brushless DC motors that are efficient and environmentally friendly. They are available in rated capacities from 30 W to 300 W and use a permanent magnet in the rotor, which contributes to energy savings. Unlike induction motors, the speed remains constant, with an extended speed control range and constant torque.

BMU motors reach 80 - 4,000 rpm and are controlled by AC drivers. Synchronization of actual and command speed allows easy control by knob and display. The motors are dust protected, waterproof (IP66/IP67) and available with either spur or hollow shaft gearboxes. Cables can be routed to the shaft, to the rear or vertically. In addition, the integrated overload alarm warns if the motor exceeds the continuous operating range.

The BMU Series offers customizable solutions, optimizes energy consumption and ensures reliable performance.

c3controls has launched a new line of In­dus­tri­al Power Sup­plies that provide stable, low voltage power for equip­ment that re­quires con­trol with­in elec­tric­al pan­els and en­clos­ures. The new Series IPS power sup­plies de­liv­er up to 93% ef­fi­ciency, the best in its class among com­par­able devices, and are avail­able in out­put power ranges from 60W to 480W and voltage op­tions in 12, 24 and 48V. Ideal for reg­u­lat­ing power loads in res­id­en­tial, com­mer­cial and in­dus­tri­al ap­plic­a­tions such as HVAC, man­u­fac­tur­ing, in­dus­tri­al auto­ma­tion, and pump and mo­tor con­trol, the c3 power sup­plies are UL lis­ted, CE marked, and RoHS com­pli­ant. 

The ul­tra-com­pact Series IPS power sup­plies range in width from 43 to 60mm, and are de­signed to fit in pan­els of al­most any size, with quick and simple snap-on in­stall­a­tion on a 35mm DIN Rail. The con­trol devices provide re­li­able pro­tec­tion against short cir­cuit, over­load, over­voltage and over-tem­per­at­ure oc­cur­rences, and fea­ture an auto-re­cov­ery func­tion. The out­put voltage of the devices is flex­ibly ad­justable from 100 to 116%. The LED in­dic­a­tion al­lows users to see the avail­ab­il­ity of the DC power out­put to as­sist in troubleshoot­ing. The power sup­plies from 240W to 480W come with DC OK Re­lay Con­tacts to provide status sig­nals to the mon­it­or­ing sys­tem.
 

De­term­in­ing a safe ab­so­lute po­s­i­tion usu­ally re­quires us­ing highly com­plex tech­no­logy. Pep­perl+Fuchs of­fers much sim­pler solu­tions for this pro­cess, which are based on a com­bin­a­tion of the new PUS eval­u­ation unit with the safePXV or WCS sensors. Safety func­tions (SF) com­ply­ing with SIL 3 and PL e can there­fore be achieved with min­im­al in­teg­ra­tion ef­fort.
The safePXV non­con­tact ab­so­lute po­s­i­tion­ing sys­tem only re­quires one cam­era-sup­por­ted sensor since it provides in­trins­ic re­dund­ancy through mul­ti­colored Data Mat­rix codes. For lin­ear-guided ap­plic­a­tions such as mono­rail con­vey­ors and auto­mated stor­age and re­triev­al sys­tems, it of­fers po­s­i­tion­ing with mil­li­meter pre­ci­sion over tracks up to 10 kilo­met­ers in length.

Safe po­s­i­tion and speed

The rugged WCS po­s­i­tion en­cod­ing sys­tem for ab­so­lute po­s­i­tion­ing in out­door areas uses a stain­less steel code rail with re­cesses. In the safe ver­sion, two U-shaped read heads mon­it­or this rail and en­sure re­li­able de­tec­tion along track dis­tances of up to 314.5 meters, even in ad­verse con­di­tions such as those found when op­er­at­ing port cranes. 
The re­dund­ant sig­nals from the sensors are pro­cessed and eval­u­ated by the PUS-F161-B safe eval­u­ation unit via two chan­nels. The device acts as a gate­way to the field­bus. It gen­er­ates a safe po­s­i­tion value (Safe­Pos SF), which it can also use to de­term­ine a safely mon­itored speed (SafeSpeed SF). Ap­plic­a­tions that in­teg­rate the sensors and the eval­u­ation unit are cer­ti­fied ac­cord­ing to IEC 61508 for SIL 3 and ac­cord­ing to EN 13849 for PL e. They en­able quick and easy com­mis­sion­ing through pre-cer­ti­fic­a­tion and pre-con­fig­ur­a­tion.
 

Earlier this year, the World Heart Federation, the global organisation that focuses on cardiovascular disease prevention, reported that deaths caused by this condition had increased globally from 12.1 million in 1990 to 20.5 million in 2021, making cardiovascular disease the highest cause of deaths worldwide ( ) . While improvements in diet, regular exercising and advances in medication can help prevent and manage the disease, medical procedures are often required to treat more advanced symptoms.

Procedures as such can have various purposes like removing defective or harmful biological matter in arteries, supporting the administration of medication to better the condition, and assisting with the overall blood circulation. The commonality between these procedures is their requirement for medical devices that rely on the controlled rotation of an electric motor. The size requirements, as well as the relatively low power needs, mean that miniature DC motor technology is commonly used.

Atherectomy

Atherosclerosis is the accumulation of fatty substances, cholesterol and calcium within the arteries. Significant narrowing can cause conditions such as peripheral and coronary artery disease, and the deposits, known as plaque, need to be removed from the artery walls to restore blood flow. This atherectomy process is achieved by cutting, shaving and sanding the inhibiting material with a motor-driven medical device.
Considering the small space envelope of operation and the potential for damage to a healthy artery, the main motion requirement is precise control of the end effector. This must be combined with high speed, sufficient to effectively cut or grind the plaque, whilst minimising procedure time to improve the patient outcome.

Brushless DC motors (BLDC) are the preferred technology. With a design that uses electronic commutation via an external controller, this precise modulation enables rapid switching of the motor's windings that achieves high speed. Improving synchronisation between the rotor's position and the current applied to the coils allows smoother motor operation, necessary to reach the required speed. Portescap’s Ultra ECTM BLDC motors, for example, can deliver speeds up to 73,000 rpm. In combination with speed, providing high torque to weight and footprint, a motor as small as just 16 mm diameter can be used.

Another key advantage of a BLDC motor’s external commutation is enhanced control precision. This allows close modulation of speed and torque, ensuring effective plaque removal while minimising the risk of damage to the arterial wall. Improved control also enables more targeted treatment, resulting in reduced procedural complications and better outcomes for patients. Precise control is enhanced with low vibration, a feature of a BLDC motor like the Ultra EC™, while low noise enhances the experience, both for the patient as well as surgical staff.

Thrombectomy

While a stroke is categorised as a neurological condition, an acute ischemic stroke involves the blockage of an artery, preventing blood flow to part of the brain. This blockage could be caused by a plaque build-up, or a blood clot. Procedures can be used to dissolve the blood clot, and this treatment may also be required for cases of DVT (deep vein thrombosis) and pulmonary embolism. A thrombolysis procedure involves drug administration to remove the clot, while alternatively, thrombectomy uses specialised catheters and devices to capture, dismantle, and remove the clot. Within these devices, coreless brushed DC motors are preferable, primarily for their characteristics of light weight combined with high power to weight ratio. The design of the motor removes the traditional iron core, replacing it with a specially designed winding. This makes coreless brushed DC motors, like the Portescap AthlonixTM, compact and lightweight, ensuring ease of manoeuvrability within the catheter, enabling rotation of the end effector to break up the clot. Coreless brushed DC motors also give smooth and precise speed regulation, particularly at lower speeds, while operating with minimal vibration. These factors are essential to maintain control precision, and they also ensure smooth and reliable functioning of the thrombolysis treatment devices. As coreless brushed DC motors generate low noise levels and are low in vibration, the patient experience is also optimised.

Circulatory support

Even when under close medical monitoring, patients with weakened hearts, such as those awaiting a heart transplant or wider cardiovascular treatment, are at risk of a temporary pause in heart function. Though heart pumping can restart, this can impact the heart’s ability to resume normal flow thereafter. To help prevent this, ventricular assist devices, also known as cardiac assist devices, support the heart in pumping blood through weakened chambers.

These devices can be intracorporeal (inside the body) or extracorporeal (outside the body). In both cases, the pumps are driven by miniature motors, essential for the form factor, particularly for intracorporeal use, and the main motion requirements are high precision with maximum responsiveness to follow the natural rhythm of the heart. As a result, BLDC motors are the typical choice. As BLDC motors use electronic commutation, this optimises precise control over speed and torque, which in turn means accuracy in pump speed and flow. Consequently, the pump can closely mimic the natural functioning of the heart and is able to dynamically adapt to a patient’s changing requirements. Portescap’s Ultra EC BLDC motor enhances this level of control with smoother torque flow thanks to the lower inductance and cogging torque generated by the slotless design.

To ensure reliable operation, as well as patient safety, minimising motor temperature rise during operation is also crucial. BLDC motors ensure high efficiency with minimal losses, thanks to the reduction in friction that they provide, keeping temperature at a controlled level. This efficiency, combined with reduced mechanical wear, also enhances reliability.

Customisation

To specify the optimal miniature motion solution, it is crucial to fully understand the requirements of the procedure and host device. Getting this right from the start will ensure a more efficient development and integration programme, achieving a faster time to market.

This is particularly important as customisation of the motion solution is often required. Customisation can impact form factor and weight, overall design integration, as well as performance. As a result, working with motor designers like Portescap from outset of the project will ensure the best outcome for the patient experience, the surgical staff, as well as the OEM device designer.
 

JAI A/S marked its 60-year cor­por­ate an­niversary. Foun­ded in Den­mark in 1963 by Jørgen An­der­sen, the com­pany designs, man­u­fac­tures and sells in­dus­tri­al area scan and line scan cam­er­as used in fact­ory auto­ma­tion sys­tems, food sort­ing, semi­con­duct­or in­spec­tion, life sci­ences, in­tel­li­gent traffic sys­tems, and oth­er in­dustry seg­ments around the world. JAI en­gin­eered its first in­dus­tri­al cam­era 50 years ago. Since then, the com­pany has ex­pan­ded its op­er­a­tions both or­gan­ic­ally and through an ac­quis­i­tion of a Ja­pan­ese in­dus­tri­al cam­era man­u­fac­turer, and through the ac­quis­i­tion of the Ja­pan­ese Cali­for­nia-based cam­era man­u­fac­turer Pul­nix. This lat­ter ac­quis­i­tion not only strengthened JAI's po­s­i­tion as a glob­al pro­vider of area scan and line scan cam­er­as for the ma­chine vis­ion in­dustry, but also launched JAI in­to the field of spe­cial­ized traffic cam­er­as and sub­sys­tems.

Today, JAI of­fers a ro­bust product port­fo­lio com­pris­ing more than 100 fea­ture-rich stand­ard in­dus­tri­al cam­era mod­els, com­ple­men­ted by a range of high-res­ol­u­tion cam­er­as and spe­cial multi-sensor cam­er­as de­signed to sup­port ad­vanced vis­ion re­quire­ments in the ma­chine vis­ion in­dustry.

Multis­pec­tral ima­ging

JAI’s multi-sensor cam­er­as fea­ture in­nov­at­ive prism-based tech­no­logy not avail­able from most oth­er cam­era man­u­fac­tur­ers. These cam­er­as in­clude 3-sensor prism-based area scan and line scan cam­er­as, which are prized for their high de­gree of col­or ac­cur­acy in food sort­ing, phar­ma­ceut­ic­als, print­ing, and life sci­ences ap­plic­a­tions. Prism tech­no­logy is also used to cre­ate cam­er­as for multis­pec­tral ima­ging, com­bin­ing the vis­ible spec­trum with near-in­frared (NIR) or short-wave in­frared (SWIR) ima­ging to re­veal de­fects and oth­er data that can’t be de­tec­ted un­der vis­ible wavelengths alone.  

Ac­cord­ing to Jørgen An­der­sen, JAI’s longev­ity in the in­dustry is not only due to in­nov­a­tions such as these multi-sensor cam­er­as, but also to the com­pany’s long­stand­ing fo­cus on qual­ity and strong cus­tom­er re­la­tion­ships. "We de­vel­op new cam­er­as and func­tion­al­ity in close co­oper­a­tion with cus­tom­ers aim­ing at im­prov­ing the ef­fi­ciency of their vis­ion sys­tems. And cus­tom­ers want cam­er­as that not only work ex­cep­tion­ally well, but of­fer ex­cep­tion­al re­li­ab­il­ity,” says Jørgen An­der­sen. 
Jørgen An­der­sen re­mains act­ive in the com­pany, serving as chair­man of the board and con­trib­ut­ing to shap­ing the com­pany's fu­ture stra­tegic dir­ec­tion. He sees the 60-year an­niversary as both a time to re­flect and to look ahead.

Stabilus presents Industrial POWERISE®, the new product family of electromechanical drive systems for industry. Mechanical engineering and automation manufacturers benefit from safe, comfortable, and fully automatic movement of maintenance flaps, covers, adjustment units and sliding doors. Industrial POWERISE® enables, improves, and automates the opening, closing, lifting, lowering, adjusting and holding of movable components. The base variant IPR35 is available as of October 2023. It offers internal sensors and is the ideal solution for moderate forces of up to 2.5 kN. Additional variants will follow in 2024 with expanded functions and for high force requirements: from IPR35 Smart and IPR40 to the smart “flagship” IPR40 Smart. In the American markets, the corresponding product launch is expected to take place six months later.

Maintenance-free and suitable for combination with gas springs

Industrial POWERISE® stands out for its maintenance-free operation suitable for industrial environments, with protection up to class IP69k. Manual adjustment protects the user and machine even in emergencies like power outages. Because the electromechanical drives can be connected to Stabilus pneumatic springs, dynamic forces can be combined with load compensation – a unique system offer within the industry.

Standard variants with individual options

Various combinations of technical functions and parameters are available even in the standard variants. “Our customers can choose from available spindle pitches from two to 30 millimeters, multiple connection options and different forces, strokes and speeds” says Jürgen Roland, VP of the Business Unit Industrial at Stabilus Group. The IPR35 and IPR40 product variants are recommended as the standard for manufacturers who install their own controllers in their products. 

Customized adaptation or a custom series

Through the Stabilus expert brand ACE, mechanical engineers can even purchase small quantities from the factory in different lengths and configurations. Hahn pneumatic springs, another Stabilus brand support customers in individual adjustments, expected to be available from spring 2024 – such as custom lengths, motors with a range of available voltages and torques, and different spindle pitches. In addition, Industrial POWERISE® allows for joint development of drive series, which Stabilus then manufactures exclusively for the individual customer. 

Through customization, the Stabilus Group is reinforcing its position as a motion solution provider. Industrial customers can receive coordinated overall solutions for their movement control needs. The product family builds on the success of the IATF certified Automotive POWERISE® drive. In around two decades, over 50 million units of the drive have been produced and installed for almost every major manufacturer, down to the mid-range passenger car segment. 
 

Compact device designs combined with high energy efficiency in electronic devices lead to higher electromagnetic interferences. Components are placed closer together and powerful semiconductors switch at a high clock rate. The new Schurter FMAB NEO HP filter series is ideally suited for such demanding applications. Thanks to high quality core materials, they achieve very high attenuation in a compact design.

High-performance in compact design

The new versions provide very high symmetrical attenuation (design N). In the low and mid frequency range, asymmetric attenuation has been increased as well by employing new high-quality core materials. Overall, this results in a very high filter performance, which is otherwise only achieved by larger filters. Due to the same size, the standard FMAB NEO Design N filter can be easily replaced with the new high-performance filter when the EMC measurement results require it. 

The new filter variants are ideally suited for demanding applications such as laboratory and medical equipment. They also work well in many industrial, telecom and energy applications. The new variants of the FMAB NEO single-stage filter family are available with rated currents from 1 A to 30 A at a maximum of 250 VAC. They are suitable for applications in the temperature range -40 °C to 100 °C and have ENEC and cURus approvals.
 

The C6043 is a par­tic­u­larly power­ful ad­di­tion to the ul­tra-com­pact in­dus­tri­al PC series by Beck­hoff, which is char­ac­ter­ized primar­ily by the second board level for an NVIDIA graph­ics pro­cessing unit (GPU). With the ex-fact­ory as­signable slot for power­ful graph­ics cards, the unit, which meas­ures just 132 x 202 x 127 mm, can be equipped with highly par­al­lel­iz­ing and long-term avail­able NVIDIA GPUs in ad­di­tion to its mod­ern In­tel® Core™ pro­cessors. This makes it ideal as a cent­ral con­trol unit for chal­len­ging ap­plic­a­tions, e.g. ap­plic­a­tions that place high de­mands on 3D graph­ics or with deeply in­teg­rated vis­ion and AI pro­gram mod­ules with min­im­al cycle times. The Twin­CAT 3 auto­ma­tion soft­ware can map these func­tions fully in­teg­rated along­side the clas­sic con­trol­ler, without ad­di­tion­al soft­ware or in­ter­faces. With the ad­di­tion­al freely as­signable PCIe com­pact mod­ule slot, the C6043 can also be flex­ibly ex­pan­ded with ad­di­tion­al in­ter­faces. The power sup­ply and cool­ing sys­tem provide enough power to fully ex­ploit the po­ten­tial of the ex­tern­al graph­ics card and the latest In­tel® pro­cessors.

Up to 24 pro­cessor cores

With the 12th and 13th gen­er­a­tion In­tel® Core™ pro­cessors, the C6043 already of­fers ex­cel­lent com­put­ing without an ex­tern­al graph­ics card. For the very first time, the In­tel® Core™ i5, i7, and i9 pro­cessors have been in­stalled in a hy­brid ar­chi­tec­ture. As with the pre­vi­ous pro­cessor gen­er­a­tions, In­tel® Cel­er­on®, Pen­ti­um®, and Core™ i3 of­fer clas­sic per­form­ance cores; Core™ i5, Core™ i7, and Core™ i9, on the oth­er hand, also have four, eight, and six­teen ef­fi­cient cores, re­spect­ively. This com­bin­a­tion of per­form­ance and ef­fi­ciency cores al­lows ap­plic­a­tions to be im­ple­men­ted on a total of up to 24 real pro­cessor cores. While per­form­ance cores are primar­ily suit­able for high-per­form­ance, single-thread ap­plic­a­tions, many ad­di­tion­al threads can be ex­ecuted in real time or in user mode on the ad­di­tion­al ef­fi­ciency cores. What’s more, each in­di­vidu­al core can be con­figured in­di­vidu­ally via Twin­CAT in the clock fre­quency.

Over the past two years, GHGSat has enabled the mitigation of 5.6 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions from industrial facilities around the world.

ABB has secured a third contract with GHGSat, the global leader in high-resolution greenhouse gas monitoring from space, to manufacture optical sensors for their C12, C13, C14 and C15 satellites set to launch into orbit in 2024.

Expanding monitoring capabilities

The new satellites will join GHGSat’s expanding constellation which detects and quantifies industrial gas leaks from space. ABB has built the payloads – the instruments carried on board the satellites – for ten of GHGSat’s emissions monitoring satellites launched into space. 

Earlier this year, GHGSat reported that their existing satellites have doubled their methane emission measurement capabilities thanks to the exceptional performance of the sensors (https://www.ghgsat.com/en/newsroom/microsatellites-surpasses-performance-expectations-in-greenhouse-gas-monitoring/). This has allowed GHGSat to accelerate the scaling of its monitoring services, aiding industries such as oil and gas, power generation, mining, and more in understanding and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Collaboration with international space programs

ABB has been a leader in gas sensing from orbit for over two decades, starting with the development of the Canadian Space Agency SCISAT mission payload, which profiles the concentration of more than 70 different gas types down to parts per trillion from cloud top to outer space. 

ABB also provided hyperspectral technologies to the Japanese GOSAT program, which pioneered the global mapping at regional scale of sources and sinks of greenhouse gases from orbit starting with a first satellite in 2009 and an improved version in 2018. 
Today, ABB builds on this legacy by manufacturing enhanced versions of GHGSat’s proprietary wide-angle Fabry-Perot (WAF-P) interferometer, which tracks the same infrared fingerprint of greenhouse gases. In this way, ABB applies its vast expertise acquired in earlier high-profile government space missions to the private sector space with a focus on actionable low latency satellite data for civil uses.

Space is the only location that allows greenhouse gas emissions to be monitored freely across jurisdictions, enabling unbiased reporting.