Fieldbus Foundation urges approval of IEC 61158 fieldbus standard
Fieldbus Foundation™ urges approval of IEC 61158 fieldbus standard
Keyword Fieldbus
The Fieldbus Foundation™has voiced strong support for approval by all the IEC National committees of the proposed data link layer (DLL) and application layer (AL) final draft international standard (FDIS) documents of the IEC 61158 international fieldbus standard.
According to Fieldbus Foundation president John Pittman, approval of the DLL and AL FDIS is "essential to the standardisation of a single international, interoperable fieldbus, which has long been an objective of suppliers and end users of measurement and control technology".
Pittman said, "The Fieldbus Foundation urges all the national standards committees to consider what is best for our industry. Clearly, end users are not satisfied with the confusion, high cost and lack of integration which results from having numerous de facto fieldbus standards. The IEC committee members should seriously consider the needs of the user community, as opposed to the narrow commercial interests of a handful of equipment suppliers, when casting their vote during the upcoming ballot".
He added, "The IEC fieldbus committee, which comprises highly respected communications experts from 19 countries, has produced a non-proprietary, technically correct fieldbus standard embedded with the best features of the leading fieldbus solutions. It is a superior alternative to regional specifications, such as the CENELEC Euro Norm (EN) 50 170, which incorporates older, less advanced, non-interoperable protocols. End users around the world want and deserve the best available fieldbus technology".
Earlier this year, more than 78 per cent of the voting nations on the IEC SC65C/WG6 committee voted in favour of the proposed IEC 61158 DLL and AL draft international standard (DIS)during a technical ballot. The DLL and AL DIS will become an FDIS if approved by the current ballot, which will be completed by late September.
IEC 61158 provides rich functionality which enables implementers to provide fieldbus solutions for both process and manufacturing automation. The standard encompasses different sub-sets or "profiles", each having a set of features that are optimised for a specific market or application. These profiles are designed to ensure acceptance by the supplier community, excellent performance for the objective applications,and conformance to the standards.
It is not necessary for a commercial group to implement every feature available in IEC 65118 in order to rightfully claim full compliance with the international standard; the implementer must only conform exactly to a given profile specified in the standard.
The fieldbus functionality specified by IEC 61158 is unique inasmuch as it permits centralised control,control in the field, or a mixture of control loops in both locations. It is designed to provide robust synchronous control, and support asynchronous communication of data for use in diagnostics, reporting, maintenance and troubleshooting. Inherent to the IEC fieldbus is an enhanced access control method and services for all modern data models, including client/server,publisher/subscriber and report distributor. Multi-segment networking is supported by extending addressing and bridging with secure data transfer.
Additional features include accurate time distribution and synchronisation across multi-segment systems, online device detection and configuration, and online support for scheduling revision and construction.
The Fieldbus Foundation is a not-for-profit corporation consisting of over 120 leading process and manufacturing automation companies worldwide whose major purpose is to provide an open and neutral environment for the development of a single, international,interoperable fieldbus. In this environment, end users, manufacturers,universities and research organisations are working together to develop the technology, provide development tools, support and training, co-ordinate field trials and demonstrations, and enable product interoperability. Visit their Web site at www.fieldbus.org
For further information contact Fieldbus Foundation European Operations, PO Box 708, Ede, The Netherlands. Tel: +31 (0)318 692885; Fax: +31 (0)318 643157; E-mail: hvdb@fieldbus.org
