The Hannover International, Warrington, Cheshire, England

30th April 2002 - 3rd May 2002

How can one attend, never mind report on, a very busy conference with over sixty interesting technical presentations many of which over lap and attended by almost 300 interested delegates?
A series of lectures and talks together with a what was called a technology showcase was held by Emerson Project Management with INEOS Chlor and Kvaerner E&C in Cheshire recently. This extremely well attended event was a veritable mine of information to the Instrumentation and Control Engineer. Over 200 people listened to up to 35 lectures arranged in 5 streams with provocative titles like: Attaining world class manufacturing, Connecting to Corporate IT, The Culture of Success, Automation Systems Safety and Standards and Pharmaceuticals & Fine Chemicals.
Now you can begin to appreciate the dilemma of this reporter in commenting on what happened there. How can I do it.
Well I suppose the best that can be done is to is to report on the talks that I did attend. Although this is an esoteric view of the event it hopeful will present a flavour of the atmosphere.

The first day was given over to one-day session mostly conducted by EPM personal on their own products, Provox and DeltaV as well as those on Cost Effective Pharma Compliance, an AMS (Asset Management Solutions) workshop and a meeting of the Emerson Fieldbus Foundation User Group. Though these sessions were well attended the bulk of the delegates came on the following day.

In a tightly controlled programme, divided as we said under six headings, all delegates assembled for a keynote speech periodically during the next two days.

Technology Showcase Exhibitors Anixter (UK) Ltd Asco Joucomatic Ltd Belden Wire & cable Control Techniques CSI Ltd Emerson Project Management Eurotech Automation Fluke UK Ltd GeCMA International Hima-Sella Limited Hytork Control Europe ICS Triplex Intellution ISA England Section Knuerr UK Kvaerner E&C MTL Instruments O'Hare Engineering Ltd OSI Software GmbH Phoenix Contact Ltd SAAB Tank Control UK Ltd Thermo Nobel Ltd Transmitton

Chris Garton of INEOS Chlor in the first of these, a talk which I suppose encapsulated the whole event, discussed "Unlocking the hidden plant." (INEOS Chlor was originally ICI). How to make the whole plant work better by managing the assets and resources which it has at its disposal. This usually involves changing our mindset and our way of looking at things. This is an never ending journey as circumstances change constantly.

A consistent feature of this event was the quality of the speakers which was invariably impressive. These were people who loved their subject and were completely at home in talking about it.

"What sort of people do World class manufacturers want?" (Phil Sharp of Elliott Marsh) was a presentation which looked at not only the people to be employed but also the employer and the interaction of the different types of people and organisations on each other. He stressed the importance of "a good cultural mix" between job applicant and the organisation.

The breaks during the sessions for coffee or the buffet lunch provided much opportunity for discussion and networking between participants or for visiting the exhibits which were running concurrently with the forum.

As our discipline grows and changes IT becomes more important and is taking an ever more important role in the successful execution of engineering projects. Indeed in this presentation information was described as a key enabler. (Don Churchill - Kvaerner E&C).

There are of course Complience issues n connecting to corporate IT and this presents a continual challenge in a process manufacturing facility. The issues raised were discussed by Guy Wingate, Global Computer Validation Director for Glaxo Smith Kline.

In what was one of the most provocative of the keynotes, David Cockshoot of Kvaerner E&C gave us his thoughts on valuing the information asset and how many companies are loosing efficiency and indeed cash money because they are unaware or do not know how to harness the information generated in the running of their plant.

Vincent Cantwell (left)from Tyco Healthcare's Dublin plant (Mallincrodt) took us through calibration strategies in a regulated facility, striving to achieve an optimum balance between regulatory Complience and commercial practicalities.

Another speaker from Kvaerner E&C, Bob De Quidt, presented some key pointers on doing a successful concept study.

Cruisrrath is the name of latest Bristol-Myers Squib pharmaceutical plant at a green field site north of Dublin. The DCS part of the plant is now approaching the end of software factory acceptance tests. Cormac Callaghan, Director of Bulk Projects for Europe (right) focused on the significant lessons learnt on this project capturing the critical points that are vital for successful DCS project execution covering the resources, documentation, planning, initial definition and change management, approach and prototyping, third party equipment vendor performance and testing.

John Hartley of Emerson Process Management discussed the various busses and their advantages and disadvantages in a talk entitled "Which bus should I use." The cost-cutting in the eliminating of cable alone makes this a must-be not only for modern plants but also for consideration in the upgrading of older plants.

The strategy needed to effect changing a company's infrastructure and culture to facilitate good validation practice was included in the talk on Quality Validation from Keith Powell-Evens from Kvaerner E&C. In an excellent presentation, marred by some problems from a faulty projector he examined how best to identify qualification problems before they effect capital and revenue programmes, the budget set against them and product quality.

The only hardware presentation I attended was that on "Gas metering - the next generation," given by Don Griffiths and Bas van Ravenswaaij of Emerson Process Management. The UK's recent clean-air legislation has led to greater emphasis on performance rather than design specifications in the area of gas metering and here the contributions of the coriolis meter to this market and the considerable costs in installation and design that could be made were discussed.

A fundamental issue was discussed by Travis Hesketh (left), who manages project sales activities within Emerson Process Management and who coincidentally was the organised of the whole conference. He started with the provocative question "The IT department, the Accounts , and MIS seem able to tap endless capital, whilst getting investment process plant and automation is almost impossible to get approved. Why? What are the engineers doing wrong?" This entertaining and provocative presentation should certainly get help to get the purse strings untied!

Finally, at the end, for most, of two very full days Ron Migliorini(Emerson Process Management) sent us all home with an comprehensive précis of the events of the seminar and a robust "call to action."

All in all I thought this seminar and associated table-top show well worth the money it cost to attend. All the talks were recorded, and the presentations will be available on CD to attendees. Recordings of talks from previous ME Seminars were available for a nominal fee which was donated in its entirety to a worthy charity.