Yokogawa enhances IT/OT integration with new release of OpreX Collaborative Information Server

Yokogawa Electric Corporation announced the release of the latest version of OpreX™ Collaborative Information Server (CI Server), a product in the OpreX Control and Safety System family, with enhancements that streamline application assembly and improve external connectivity.

OpreX Collaborative Information Server brings together large volumes of data from various plant equipment and systems to enable the optimized management of production activities across an entire enterprise, and provide the environment needed to remotely monitor and manage operations from any location and make swift decisions.

Development Background. Plants incorporate a wide range of equipment and devices, and it is essential to have the capability to swiftly detect and address any abnormalities in normal operations and utilize the data held by other systems and devices to increase maintenance efficiency. As such, systems need to have connectivity with other systems and devices, as well as functionality that enables them to leverage the information they collect.

1. Addition of CI Gateway component. At renewable energy facilities and the like, gateways are deployed at various locations for the collection of data required for integrated monitoring and operations. And in all kinds of industries, the use of gateways for the relay of plant data to assemble higher-level applications is a common practice. In this release, a new component, CI Gateway, has been added. Compared to the previous version, this allows for simpler and more flexible implementation, making it easier to deploy OpreX Collaborative Information Server as a dedicated gateway.

 

2. Support of RESTful API. The RESTful API is a standard web application interface that is widely used in IT applications. With this release, it is now possible to access OpreX Collaborative Information Server data via the RESTful API. This facilitates access to operational technology (OT) data and leads to closer convergence between IT and OT systems, thereby realizing seamless integration and the efficient use of data. For example, it is now possible to construct a general-purpose web browser-based KPI dashboard that aggregates and displays data from various systems.

3. Enhanced IEC 61850 communication driver. IEC61850 is an international protocol for communication networks/systems that is essential in the renewable energy industry. The enhanced support for this standard enables users to select safer interactive operations in place of certain operations that previously were executed automatically. For greater flexibility in operations, it is also now possible to utilize device report data as OpreX Collaborative Information Server data.

Major Target Markets. Oil and gas, petrochemicals, chemicals, renewable energy, power, pulp and paper, pharmaceuticals, food, mining, iron and steel, water distribution, and wastewater treatment

Applications. Plant monitoring and control; data collection, provision, and storage; etc.