ABB Automation & Power World 2013 - Live Coverage

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Headlines from March 26, 2013 Show News

To fight all the economic, political and technical turmoil battering people, companies, governments and regions, ABB Group and ABB North America's leaders stressed their commitment to serving their customers and increasing organic growth, continuing aggressive investment in R&D and disciplined acquisitions, and maintaining the personal integrity to keep these promises. » Read more

Lean Manufacturing's Unexpected Windfall

"I usually talk about how lean manufacturing makes companies more profitable and gives them a competitive advantage," began Charles Cohon, CEO of Prime Devices Corp. in his presentation at ABB Automation & Power World this week in Orlando, Fla. "But today, let's talk about carbon footprint—the amount of electricity you use, the fossil fuel you burn, raw material utilization, water usage, sewer emissions—things like that." » Read more

When it comes to lean manufacturing, there's a seemingly never-ending stream of phrases to identify the various methodologies—5S, kanbans, value-stream mapping, spaghetti diagrams, kaizen, kaikaku...the list goes on and on. "But we don't see safety in there anywhere," said John McHale, engineering manager for ABB Jokab Safety. "A lot of times, it's an afterthought." » Read more

Nearly a decade ago, Baldor Electric Co. set out to simplify and redesign the ubiquitous right-angle gearboxes widely used in industry to transmit power to cooling tower fans. But a funny thing happened on the way to a new gearbox design, according to Roman Wajda: The gearbox was eliminated altogether in favor of an innovative direct motor drive solution that achieved significant gains in energy efficiency and dramatically improved reliability. » Read more

PLCs Help Optimize Alternative Energy Processes

Energy providers are trying to increase the amount of power available at the places where it's needed, with fewer people manning the switches. It's in this capacity that programmable logic controllers (PLCs) are finding increased usage, optimizing the processes that help wind turbines, solar farms and more to produce the most energy with the least amount of resources, explained Terry Watson, account manager at ABB. » Read more

Headlines from March 27, 2013 Show News

After hearing Shawn Henry, president of CrowdStrike Services, give dire warnings about the rampant threats to network infrastructures and the data they hold, IBM's Michael Valocchi wondered aloud whether perhaps we should just keep all that big data to ourselves at  ABB Automation & Power World this week. » Read more

It's good to learn about a place before you move there — especially if you're a process historian that's thinking about moving its data to the cloud. Unfortunately, many potential users still don't know exactly what "the cloud" is, how it works, how they could benefit from using it, and how they can do so securely and safely. » Read more

Operator Is Focus of Latest System 800xA Enhancements

"We see demographic change, fewer available operators available and shorter attention spans," began Tobias Becker, senior vice president, global business unit manager, control technologies, for ABB in his review of the latest enhancements to company's 800xA automation platform at this week's ABB Automation & Power World. » Read more

Most people don't typically consider 2 to be a very high number. Even putting it in the context of a percentage, it's still not high. Now consider that it's the percentage of global power consumed by data centers. Still not high? Then try this: That power used is a carbon equivalent greater than the entire airline industry. » Read more

Greg Livelli, product group manager for ABB's flow measurement products, described the division's new and upcoming solutions in his presentation, "Building the Future: What's New in Instrumentation and Why it Matters," at this week's ABB Automation and Power World 2013. » Read more

Headlines from March 28, 2013 Show News

Make the Most of Your Generation Gaps

In the old days, there was just one Generation Gap. Now there appear to be at least three in the United States, with another one already on the way. Each generation is characterized by its own styles of work and motivation, and understanding their particular needs and operating modes is essential to optimal organizational performance. » Read more

Operators in the process and energy industries stand to benefit from technology now advancing in the consumer market–everything from augmented reality to autonomous quadcopters. So say Jonas Brännvall, global product group manager, extended automation, for ABB, and Elina Vartiainen, scientist in ABB's corporate research group. » Read more

In the course of an ongoing control system upgrade at its Greenwood Energy Center (GWEC), DTE Energy engineers also undertook to rationalize and reorganize a decades-old, dysfunctional approach to process alarms. "Previously, many of our DCS alarms were not rationalized," explained Kip Dobel, senior engineer in GWEC's Engineering Support Organization. » Read more

Three years into the U.S. economy's most anemic post-war recovery, signs finally are pointing to stronger growth over the next few years, according to Timothy Gill, economics director for NEMA. "Even as things improve, we have to be aware of the two elephants in the room," he added. » Read more

For some 20 years at least, organizations have been challenged to protect their enterprise networks from attack. Proprietary protocols once offered some level of protection, but their convergence into common IP platforms brought new network vulnerabilities to the fore. » Read more

There's a growing interest in electrical energy management, and it's no wonder as costs continue their meandering upward path. Even as new resources are found, the cost to get to them and to get them to us remains high. Unpredictability appears to be the only certainty. » Read more