New SCADA System Brings
Efficiency And Flexibility
To Scottish Malting Barley Plant
ffective site-wide energy
management is a key
function of the new control
system which is being used
to synchronise heat systems
that include new biomass boilers.
E
A grain drying and storage facility
that supplies some of Scotland's
leading distilleries has installed a new
Movicon SCADA (supervisory control
and data acquisition) system from
Products4Automation (P4A) to consolidate
series of plant upgrades and expansions.
The new software is providing control
and visualisation for product movement,
processing and storage, including the
integration of biomass boilers and heat
recovery systems. Highland Grains Ltd is
an agricultural cooperative, owned by its
89 members, which dries, conditions and
stores malting barley and other crops.
It primarily supplies the Scotch whisky
distilling industry, but also exports high
quality grain to other countries.
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PECM Issue 23
Based just north of Inverness, Highland
Grains was founded in 1978 with a
capacity to handle 4,400 tonnes of barley a
year. Steady expansion has seen its annual
throughput grow to over 40,000 tonnes.
Today the plant consists of five continuous
flow dryers, seven wet and fifteen dry
storage silos (ranging from 250 tonnes to
2,300 tonnes) and two warehouse-like flat
stores of 7,500 tonnes each.
Committed to constant development, the
site also includes innovations such as heat
recovery on its drying systems, power
synchronisation and biomass boilers.
The facilities were always automated,
and the control system and software
were frequently expanded to meet new
requirements and accommodate new
equipment.
The control system has been maintained
and developed over many years by
specialist local firm Coldcurve Ltd, which
most recently was commissioned to
replace the existing much-extended
control system with an efficient state of the
art one.
The project was lead by Coldcurve
engineer Daniel Castle, who explains that
although the site's operations are relatively
complicated, a simple system architecture
was achieved: "Lorries are constantly
delivering grain from the growers, while
others collect dried malting barley for the
distilleries – it's a 24/7 process at busy
times, plus there are several different
drying processes. There are also a number
of subsidiary processes to control, such
as incoming and outgoing weighbridges,
boiler operations and heat recovery for
energy efficiency."
The whole site is now controlled from
a single, powerful PLC supporting 29
separate I/O cards.