85th NAMUR General Meeting on November 10 and 11, 2022 in Düsseldorf/Neuss

Sustainable Life Cycle Risk Management

After a ‘safety-relevant’ two-year hiatus, a NAMUR Annual General Meeting will finally take place again ‘live and in full colour’ in 2022. The many measures taken over the past two years to protect the population’s health are equivalent in industry to safety instrumented systems in technical plants.

Over the last decade the number of these systems has risen substantially, as have the requirements to be met and their technical and organisational complexity. This is what has prompted NAMUR to select functional safety again as the topic to be discussed at this year’s AGM.

Functional safety needs to be reconsidered. To look at hardware and software alone is no longer enough, what is needed today is a holistic approach. Risk management has to be extended to cover the entire life cycle of a plant. The focus has to be on solutions which offer sustainability and future viability in spite of the rapid technological change, an ever more complex working environment and demographic change.

As an independent provider of solutions in the field of safety-related automation technology and with more than 50 years of experience in functional safety, HIMA is the ideal partner for this year’s NAMUR Annual General Meeting. Since HIMA last sponsored the NAMUR AGM in 2010, the general framework for functional safety has changed and, in addition, automation security has clearly moved more into focus. This means that today we are confronted with new challenges.

‘At this year’s NAMUR Annual General Meeting we will demonstrate how we can support plant operators in digitising functional safety. We will take a holistic approach to safety and security aspects and present solutions that are tailored to operator needs such as compliance, efficiency, cost-effectiveness and sustainability,’ Jörg de la Motte, CEO HIMA, explains.

In its opening presentation, HIMA will demonstrate how complexity in functional safety can be made easier to handle by plant operators and how related processes can be digitised while at the same time creating added value. This permits plant operators to identify, reduce and master this complexity. Focusing on essentials, i.e., necessary functions, processes and interactions as well as consistent standardisation, will produce time and cost savings as well as benefits for compliance and operational excellence.

In a holistic view of digitised functional safety, automation security is of central importance. Commonalities of, and differences between, safety and security call for a different approach to safety aspects, as digitisation must not increase operating risks. A security environment derived from the IEC principles for coordinating safety and security serves as a basis for the ‘security environment for functional safety’ concept which HIMA will present.

Communication between all levels of the automation pyramid, based on open standards, is the very backbone of digitised plants. Special requirements have to be met by safety systems, in particular. New technologies such as Ethernet-APL as one of the data highways in the NOA concept will in future permit reliable safety-relevant communication down to the field level. HIMA will demonstrate this in the “Independent Open Integration” concept, highlighting the benefits of separate safety systems.

Thursday morning will be rounded off by three NAMUR presentations looking at the use of Ethernet-APL in safety-relevant applications, the dovetailing of safety and security as well as the impact of functional safety in different applications and life cycle phases from the perspective of plant operators in the process industry.

In the afternoon workshops, HIMA will take a closer look at automation security, digitised plants (communication with control systems and the field), digitised engineering and safety life cycle management. Participants will be able to experience practical safety solutions at the information and demonstration booths. Workshops conducted jointly with NAMUR members will offer the opportunity to underpin theory with practical examples.

Together with many other NAMUR workshop contributions on different topics and an interesting programme on Friday morning, the 2022 NAMUR Annual General Meeting promises to be again an extraordinary automation event.

Contact:
NAMUR e.V.
c/o Bayer AG
Nils Weber
Building K9
51368 Leverkusen
Germany
Phone: +49 (0) 214 30–71034
E-Mail: office[at]namur.de
www.namur.net

HIMA Paul Hildebrandt GmbH
Mrs Nicole Pringal
Albert-Bassermann-Straße 28
68782 Brühl
Germany
Phone: +49 (0) 6202 709-787
E-Mail: n.pringal[at]hima.com
www.hima.com