NAMUR and ZVEI publish brochure on sustainability in the process industry

Together with NAMUR, ZVEI has published the brochure "Sustainability through process automation - More efficiency and sustainability through automation, digitalisation and modularisation in the process industry". The document can be downloaded free of charge from the ZVEI website. 

Process automation is an enabler of sustainability 

The ZVEI working group "Process Automation for Sustainability", headed by Ralf Haut (KROHNE), has been working for years on the topic of how process automation can make a decisive contribution to sustainability in the process industry. In 2012, NAMUR produced a NAMUR worksheet (NA 140) on the contribution of automation technology to increasing energy efficiency. This document was created in collaboration between the two associations. 

"We have currently set around 10 % of the energy efficiency levers in motion. This is not enough in the long term, but we are well on the way to achieving a further 40% - and the products, solutions and projects mentioned in this brochure are some of the promising tools we have at our disposal," write Christine Oro-Saavedra (Managing Director of NAMUR) and Felix Seibl (Managing Director of the ZVEI Measurement Technology and Process Automation Association) in the foreword. Without claiming to be exhaustive, this brochure summarises concrete contributions of process automation to increasing sustainability from the perspective of NAMUR and ZVEI. 

This includes 

• Innovative sensor and actuator technology for monitoring and operating systems (Chapter 2),
• Energy-optimised processes, electricity instead of gas and hydrogen production (Chapter 3),
• Modular, flexible systems that support continuous optimisation (Chapter 4),
• Energy management systems that support sustainable plant operation (Chapter 5),
• Digital twins of the plants for simulation and optimisation (Chapter 6),
• connectivity for fast data transmission down to the last plant detail (chapter 7) and
• IT tools for data utilisation and analysis (chapter 8).