Industry 4.0, the fourth industrial revolution in which we are immersed, involves the incorporation of smart technologies both in industrial products and services and in production processes to achieve a new level of efficiency and responsiveness to customers that were not possible before. These are some of them and how they are applied in the products and services of Aplicaciones Tecnológicas S.A.
The digital transformation that is supposed to come with the arrival of Industry 4.0 has, in addition to its own rules, its own vocabulary. Words and terms that in less than a decade have gone from the field of science fiction to everyday technologies that we use on a daily basis. In the industrial field, it means incorporating these technologies both in production processes and in products and services to incorporate utilities that were not previously available and which have an impact on improving operational efficiency, reducing costs associated with maintenance and increasing the lifespan of assets.
To better understand this specific vocabulary better, this is a short guide explaining what they are, what they consist of and how these advances are applied in Aplicaciones Tecnológicas S.A.’s range of smart products and services for earthing and lightning protection systems (SMART EARTHING and SMART LIGHTNING).
IoT
Also known as the Internet of Things. This term refers to the grouping and interconnection of devices and objects through a network (either private or through a public network such as the Internet), where they can all be visible and interact.
The IoT revolution in the last decade has gone beyond devices that traditionally connect to a network, such as computers or mobile phones. Now, any electronic device that incorporates the right technology can be connected, whether it is a television or a washing machine, and is capable of both receiving and sending information.
All products and services of the SMART EARTHING and SMART LIGHTNING families of Aplicaciones Tecnológicas S.A. are equipped with IoT technology to provide information at all times on both the status of the facility or structure they monitor and their own status.
In this way, the smart air terminal DAT CONTROLER® REMOTE communicates via IoT the data of the installation and the state of the lightning arrester, being able to indicate if it needs any revision. The SMART EARTHING MONITORING SYSTEM solution continuously monitors the earthing systems to prevent critical situations and the ATSTORM® storm detection system, thanks to its dual sensor technology, warns of both storms that are forming in the area to be protected and those that are approaching and issues warnings sufficiently in advance to protect equipment and people.
The smart lightning counters SMART LIGHTNING LOGGER and WIND TURBINE SMART LIGHTNING LOGGER (specifically for wind turbine blades in the wind energy sector) are also equipped with this technology.
Communication M2M
The expression Machine to Machine or M2M refers to the combination of information and communication technologies (ICT) with smart, communicating devices, allowing them to interact without human intervention.
The different types of M2M connectivity include, in order of range: RFID (10 metres), Bluetooth (10 to 20 metres), WiFi (around 50 metres), low frequency (around 1,000 kilometres), GSM network via SIM cards (global range) and satellite.
With the implementation of these technologies, Aplicaciones Tecnológicas S.A. products can send information over different distances. For example, the entire smart range is equipped with IoT via GSM, accessible from anywhere in the world.
Cloud Computing
Putting simply, cloud computing is a technology that allows remote access to software, file storage and data processing over the Internet, thus being an alternative to running on a personal computer or local server. In the cloud model, there is no need to install applications locally on computers.
The data collected by the products and services of the SMART EARTHING and SMART LIGHTNING ranges are accessible to the user thanks to CONNECT, a multi-channel management platform (private web portal, mobile devices, SCADA integration, e-mail, sound alarms).
Dashboard
The perceived complexity of the 4.0 world must be presented in a highly approachable way for any user, whereby the processed and visual presentation of data facilitates information-based decision-making.
A tool that can be interpreted as a “control panel”. A dashboard monitors, analyses and visually display one or more indicators to find out what is really happening with connected assets; a kind of summary that collects performance data and displays it in real-time.
The multichannel CONNECT platform of Aplicaciones Tecnológicas S.A.’s Smart products and services has a dashboard where the user can view the status of the latter, access a history of events and export this data as a report available in various formats.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) / Machine Learning / Deep learning
Possibly the word we most associate with literature and cinema, and which has gradually found its way into everyday technologies. Also known by its abbreviation (AI), it consists of a combination of algorithms designed with the purpose of creating machines that have certain learning capabilities similar to those of human beings.
Machine learning is a type of Artificial Intelligence technique where people train machines to recognise patterns based on data and make predictions; while deep learning is an evolution of the avobe, in which training is carried out by means of an artificial neural network that imitates – to the extent of its possibilities – the behaviour of a human brain based on the received data.
The GEOELECTRIC EARTHING METER system incorporates compact equipment for geoelectrical studies, which allows remote sending of measurement data to be processed by Artificial Intelligence.
The SMART EARTHING MONITORING SYSTEM solution uses Deep Learning algorithms for the complete characterisation of the monitored system.
Big Data
The concept of Big Data refers to large volumes of data from various sources of high complexity and velocity which are therefore difficult or impossible to process with traditional methods and require specialised software applications.
The characteristic that makes Big Data so useful is the fact that it provides answers to many questions that have not even been asked before so that problems can be identified in a more comprehensible way.
By retrieving and processing a large amount of data, the smart solutions of Aplicaciones Tecnológicas S.A. are able through the application of the previously mentioned algorithms to achieve the complete optimisation of their task.
If you would like to know more about smart technology applied to earthing and lightning protection systems, you can contact us through this link.
You can also attend any of our free online training on this and other topics on our webinar page.