Distributed Control System KSU Faculty （分布式控制系统已经代教师）.pdf

Process Control in the Chemical Industries 132 DISTRIBUTED CONTROL SYSTEMS Introduction Generally, the concept of automatic control includes accomplishing two major operations; the transmission of signals (information flow) back and forth and the calculation of control actions (decision making). Carrying out these operations in real plant requires a set of hardware and instrumentation that serve as the platform for these tasks. Distributed control system (DCS) is the most modern control platform. It stands as the infrastructure not only for all advanced control strategies but also for the lowliest control system. The idea of control infrastructure is old. The next section discusses how the control platform progressed through time to follow the advancement in control algorithms and instrumentation technologies. 1. Historical Review To fully appreciate and select the current status of affairs in industrial practice it is of interest to understand the historical perspective on the evolution of control systems implementation philosophy and hardware elements. The evolution concerns the heart of any control system which is how information flow and decision making advanced. 1. Pneumatic Implementation: In the early implementation of automatic control systems, information flow was accomplished by pneumatic transmission, and computation was done by mechanical devices using bellows, spring etc. The pneumatic controller has high margin for safety since they are explosion proof. However, There are two fundamental problems associated with pneumatic implementation: • Transmission: the signals transmitted pneumatically (via air pressure) are slow responding and susceptible to interference. • Calculation: