Hi All,
I wanted to ask the brains trust if anyone has implemented Ignition SCADA as an Energy Management System.
I work in healthcare and have been tasked with the upgrade of the EMS from two old EMS solutions to a singular solution. We have hundreds of meters (Over 600 all modbus RTU with gateways), plus hundreds of modbus points to be read from other control systems, but not many setpoints to be changed.
My question is, does anyone have any experience in implementing the system as an EMS, is it better to use an EMS solution from a company such as Schneider? (Upper management do not like Schneiders product offerings as they are not modular enough).
Thanks everyone.
I had posted a similar query couple of months ago. The Schneider’s Ecostruxure is custom built for EMS with lots of drivers for their and third party energy meters pre built into it and many AI reports for EMS features built-into it. Achieving the same in Ignition would involve a lot of wok from ground work of building and testing these drivers and reports ! Its all depends upon which make are these energy meters and other devices like breakers are and whats the make and functionality of the the existing EMS software !
Hi Pramanj,
Thanks for your reply,
I think the ground up building and configuration is what we are chasing, but it seems you are correct with the amount of work it would take.
The bulk of the meters are Schneider, but the software is just using modbus to read them.
EcoStruxure unfortunately is not COTS (commercial of the shelf) so only certain integrators are allowed to install and configure it…
Did you get anywhere with your query? Did you set out to make a project to work as an EMS?
It is still not awarded to anyone. Of course Schneider is one of the bidders! Chances are 50-50 if Ignition can beat Schneider in price and features! Schneider has an advantage of having to integrate their own energy meters and purpose built AI reports! In Ignition we have to build it from ground up! But it will be a break thru if we can build it on Ignition.
If you list your device driver, people help you better.
Also what functionality does old system support?
Beside those two questions developing EMS is fairly easy and also enjoyable task in ignition.
For special driver you can use Matrikon or Kepware OPC server.
Basically the EMS devices are all MODBUS connected, so in principle Ignition’s MODBUS driver can be used to integrate with these devices. However the exact register mapping details (100’s of them per device!) to Ignition tags will have to be done and tested thoroughly.
Getting this data is one thing and interpreting them in dash boards and reports is another! This needs a lot of domain expertise to build useful reports such as heat maps, Pareto charts , sankey diagrams , energy analysis reports, etc. If they can be done in a general purpose SCADA like Ignition or not compared to a purpose built software like Schneider’s one, which is built over several years by domain experts in the EMS field, is the question. The real value for customer comes on realizing the actual savings and ROI. Its not just ability to control the plant.
Also much depends upon the target plant, if its distribution system of a building such as a hospital/mall/data center/residential complex etc or an industrial plant etc. The types of reports required will vary. The reports should give you insight into your system to be able to derive meaningful inferences and action that will improve efficiency and reduce cost etc etc etc…
However if its more for monitoring than for managing , then the advanced features may not be required. Plain vanilla SCADA with history and basic reports would suffice.
If only Modbus is required and no Power Quality information is necessary, then developing the device profiles in Ignition should not be a big deal, but if you are using Schneider meters then you could loose all the Power Quality capabilities analysis they have. Depending on the type of meter, you could have waveform captures and events analysis that is proprietary to Schneider and their software can download. We have worked with both Ignition and Schneider solutions on different energy management solutions, they both could get the job done depending on the needs. Another difference is that Schneider's has a lot of pre-defined IEEE electrical analysis reports and PQ reports, again if this is important to your hospital, then it might be a combination of both softwares what could help achieve your outcomes. Another component that hospitals utilize, and you could consider, is automated emergency and standby power systems testing. Hospitals are required to exercise gens for 30 mins with 30% load, at least once a month to determine their reliability. The backup supply system operates on a low-voltage section of the electrical network, it will usually include several ATSs, generators, gen temperatures, etc., again depending on the types of meters, and if PQ analysis is important, then you would decide for one or the other. Do you require sustainability metrics and reporting, which could require GRI302 reporting, IEEE reporting, etc, etc. Several factors to consider to decide what software would be beneficial. Data acquisition is not the real challenge, what gives you the most "energy management" analysis would be.
Hi I made one system for real time power monitoring and energy analysis dashboard. Here how it looks like. Feel free to ask more information.
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Hi,
I have a question is this difficult to make? I am new to Ignition.
Kind regards,
Andries
Hi Andries, With right knowledge and right design it would not take that much. for me it took more time, as I was new to Ignition that time and with very basic knowledge about DB, Python and Ignition modules.
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Hi Shabir, your dashboard looks great. I have lots of electrical meters on Ignition via Modbus and BACnet. Can you describe how you generated this chart?
Any insight into this would be very helpful.
Hi Shankar,
I got collected all data from meters to DB in using transaction groups as per my logging intervals. Many people put data directly to Historian. After Data availability, write a python script for data sorting in groups of days weeks and hours.
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