M4E #14: What is the Automation Pyramid?
After a well-earned rest, it’s time to continue with our Manufacturing 4 Everyone journey! Today, we are going to discover about one of the fundamental concepts in automation: the Automation Pyramid, a representation of how automation systems have been traditionally organized in a manufacturing environment. See next a RealPars video explaining this concept.
Time for Insights
Each level of the pyramid has different timeframes associated with it. Typically, information in the field and control levels has an update rate of micro/milliseconds while at the top level it can be of days or even months.
This model has been standardized inside ISA95, which purpose is to “define the interface between control functions and other enterprise functions based upon the Purdue Reference Model for CIM (hierarchical form) as published by ISA“.
When talking about the new Industry 4.0 paradigm, things change a little bit. Typically, in this classical model each layer had only visibility of its adjacent ones. However, I4.0 introduces new communications technologies that enable decentralization and a common namespace that fosters new applications. You can see a graphical representation of this new approach in the following picture from this paper.