News

Better control makes a difference

When your plant produces 65-million gallons of ethanol annually, even a slight improvement in the production process can mean a large profit. For United Wisconsin Grain Producers in Friesland, Wisconsin the bottom line depended on very minute details. “Given the scale of our plant, even a miniscule improvement multiplied over the daily volumes can add up to a huge increase in revenues”, said Tim Politano, Quality Assurance Manager. The issue was temperature control and Politano knew they had to achieve […] Read More

Minimizing variability and maximizing production

What if you could fine-tune your control system to minimize variability and maximize production? There are hundreds of process loops in an ethanol plant that can be a significant source of variability. Taking the time to identify variability and determining if control loops are a contributor is often complex and time consuming. Until now. Trident Automation is offering a software module that works in conjunction with our Trident Workbench called LoopPAC©, Control Loop Performance Monitoring. LoopPAC© is a software program […] Read More

How to determine when an alarm is really an emergency

In a quest to better manage production, high alarm rates have a negative outcome: information overload. When all systems are triggering alarms, how does any critical information get through to an operator? When Golden Grain Energy upgraded from APACS to Siemens PCS 7, Trident Automation worked with the plant to create the most customized alarm management system possible. “Our process helps the customer to better organize alarm systems,” said Nate Nutter, PCS 7 Certified Engineer, at Trident Automation. “When customers […] Read More