Plant documentation is valuable. Ideally, it should reflect the current as-built status in order to optimally support maintenance, troubleshooting, conversions and operating permits. Transferring the plant data into a new system, in addition with a fundamentally different engineering principle, often makes operators hesitant to risk upgrading to the future. This is now to change.
The tried and trusted way is good but the future is better
Word has spread that documentation in Engineering Base (EB) is even more valuable because it shows the entire digital twin of a plant and because the data in it can be directly accessed and edited across disciplines at any time – including via web services. More and more system operators therefore want to switch to the future-oriented EB, including users of AUCOTEC's classic RUPLAN software, which has achieved a highly recognized quasi-standard in the energy suppliers sector in Germany, the Czech Republic and Slovakia over decades. AUCOTEC now makes it much easier for these customers to switch to EB PTD Plant.
Challenge accepted
"We are well aware that data migration is always a challenge. Moreover, data from projects on which various experts have worked for decades is never error-free. Users tell us this time and again," explains Michaela Imbusch, Product Manager at AUCOTEC and a proven EVU expert. "Every click wrongly placed at some point comes up in a migration," she says.
The AUCOTEC team responsible has taken up this challenge and immediately developed a whole package of support measures. As a first step, Ms Imbusch recommends AUCOTEC's migration concept, which describes everything that needs to be considered and how best to get started. In the second step, RUPLAN's QA tools should check the data again for compliance with the EVU guidelines.
For the third step, RUPLAN now offers a module that makes all the above wrong clicks visible. It quickly provides an overview of the quality of the project data in terms of its object orientation via test runs and automatic evaluations. After all, they are supposed to fit into the data-centred EB.
Aptitude test with strict grading
Test run results plus overall grade: Correction runs automatically improve data and grades
For this, AUCOTEC's EVU experts have meticulously compiled a catalogue of 25 points over months, which are indispensable for a successful migration. "To do this, we have taken on a whole series of customer projects for testing and, thanks to the knowledge gained from these, we have consistently tightened up our testing and evaluation system," reports the Product Manager. Each of the 25 topics is checked in a separate test run. For this, each topic was assigned a school grade from A to F (excellent to very serious error) as a basis. "It was important for us to evaluate the severity of possible errors per checked area in practice. That worked out quite well," says Ms Imbusch happily. Thus, in addition to the basic score, the frequency of an error is included in the evaluation of each topic. And there are real no-gos: five test areas with basic scores of E or F are classified as so important that even a minimal frequency of errors here would prevent the entire migration.
Each individual test run receives a short protocol which, in addition to the individually listed grade components, always contains a formulated evaluation as well as a suggested correction. And there is a short report with the overall score from all 25 test runs.
Knowledge alone ...
However, knowing about existing errors was of course not enough for AUCOTEC's engineering experts. It is much more important that they be remedied so that the data transfer to EB can proceed as smoothly and effectively as possible. This is where step four comes in: correction runs that automatically eliminate some of the errors. Sometimes manual interventions are necessary," Michaela Imbusch admits, "but the time saved by automation is still enormous, and the quality plus is a win in any case," she emphasizes. The members of AUCOTEC's EVU working group also see it that way: "This enormously fast and clear overview of the documentation status including optimization is unique and has been received with enthusiasm. We have really hit a nerve with operators," emphasizes the Product Manager.
This removes a major burden from operators, a stumbling block. The migration work can be assessed virtually at the touch of a button. And with another click on the correction runs, it is minimized in an instant. If that doesn't deserve an "A+" ...
