[Abstract:] The urban water industry is a traditional, fundamental sector, but its development of automated control systems has lagged behind other industries in my country. The 21st century is the era of digitalization, informatization, and networking. With the rapid development of IT technology, high-end computer technology, virtual technology, embedded technology, and various advanced control technologies, only by creating the most modern and scientific automated control technologies can a new type of water enterprise achieve sustainable economic development. 【Keywords:】 Information control integration, Practical Ethernet, Virtual technology, Embedded technology, Field network technology 【Abstract:】 The city water industry is a traditional technical business. Its automation control system develops slowly and cannot keep up with the pace of other industries. The 21st century is a century of digitalization, informationization, and network connectivity. With the great leap of high-class computer technology, virtual technology, embedded technology, and all kinds of advanced control techniques, establishing the most modernized and scientific automation control technology can help construct new water enterprises of continuous economic benefit. 【Key words:】 Information control integration, Practical Ethernet, Virtual technology, Embedded technology, Field network technology 1. New Challenges Facing Automation in the Water Industry Urban water supply and drainage treatment, industrial and mining wastewater treatment, secondary water supply for urban buildings, deep treatment of drinking water, urban greywater treatment, and environmental management of rivers and lakes are the foundation of urban modernization. These projects are becoming increasingly large-scale and complex, with more and more pumping stations of all sizes, and water supply, drainage, and greywater pipelines spreading like spider webs throughout every corner of urban and rural areas. With the implementation of the "Eleventh Five-Year Plan," urban water shortages will become more severe, water resources will become more scarce, and urban pollution will become more harmful. The State Council has allocated huge sums of money to plan many South-to-North Water Diversion projects, but for severely water-scarce northern cities, this is merely a drop in the ocean. Statistics and forecasts indicate that the national urban water shortage is 2×10⁸ m³/d, sewage discharge is 6×10⁸ m³/d, and industrial wastewater has surged to 2×10⁸ m³/d. The State Council has allocated substantial funds to construct and expand water supply projects at a rate of 600×10⁴ m³/d and sewage treatment projects at a rate of 700×10⁴ m³/d annually. For over 40 years, the author has participated in the design of electrical and automation systems for dozens of large, medium, and small water supply and drainage projects; and has undertaken the design of water supply and source water dispatching systems for major cities such as Beijing and Shenzhen. The author has carefully studied typical examples of automatic control systems operating domestically and internationally over the past decade, finding that the automation level of my country's water enterprises lags behind other industries by about 10 years. The development of automation levels in various industries in my country is also too slow. Especially in water treatment projects across various systems within the water industry, many expensive water quality analysis instruments and meters have been purchased, and many advanced technologies have been introduced, but considerable detours have also been taken. Under the new circumstances, how can this traditionally fundamental enterprise maintain a foothold in the environment of economic globalization? What are the core technologies of integrated automation in the water industry? What kind of automatic control system should be established? These are serious challenges facing all of us scientific and technological workers dedicated to the water industry. 2. Requirements of Modern Water Industry for Automation Control Systems 2.1 Characteristics and Genetic Elements of Modern Water Industry Development Regardless of the vast differences in actual conditions, water supply, drainage, or sewage treatment projects undertaken by various cities and industrial and mining enterprises, a modern water enterprise shares a common characteristic: a flexible production model to adapt to the diverse demands of today's market; internationalized supply and demand capabilities to continuously save costs and shorten market supply periods; rapid production and R&D to quickly adapt to the increasingly shorter water cycle; and alliances for competitive advantage to maximize customer satisfaction. In the fiercely competitive global economic environment, water enterprises must continuously gain a competitive advantage. This requires not only strong information and network construction strategies for their factories, but also rapid and efficient integration with their business strategies. They must possess three key "genetic elements": extremely strong adaptability; extremely fast response speed; and extremely strong learning capacity. 2.2 Requirements of Modern Water Industry for Automation Control Systems Summarizing the experiences and lessons learned from successes and failures both domestically and internationally, it is clear that some foreign water groups and some domestic water groups (such as those in Shenzhen) have grown stronger and stronger, acquiring other domestic water companies on the verge of bankruptcy, precisely because they have excelled in these three "genetic elements." A deep analysis of these three "genetic elements" reveals the following requirements for a water enterprise to remain competitive in modern automation systems: 2.2.1 Extremely Strong Adaptability A modern water enterprise must strengthen its ability to perceive change, restructure its business model, and ensure that its control system supports the formation of core technologies in each process flow; the system must also support the ability to respond to risks. 2.2.2 A Modern Water Enterprise Must Possess Extremely High Response Speed. Outdated processes and equipment must be rapidly upgraded. Changes in business models necessitate innovation and a rapid response to change. Older monitoring instruments, transmitters, sensors, and actuators lacking communication capabilities must be updated quickly to achieve rapid information integration. For obsolete control equipment, network construction must be strengthened to enable the system to quickly and promptly grasp the on-site status. The system must have rapid response measures to abnormal situations when water quality or other sudden and significant changes occur. 2.2.3 A Strong Demand for Knowledge is Essential. In the era of economic globalization, market competition is extremely fierce. Those who are complacent, unaware of market changes, and lack supply chain knowledge will be passively vulnerable. Modern automatic control systems must support decision-making in market competition; the system must enhance its ability to apply data and information resources; the system must enhance its ability to extract data resources; and the system must enhance its ability to transform mature knowledge models. Ten years ago, all water treatment companies were out of the question. Even those newly built or expanded in the last decade, while achieving progress and effectiveness in some areas, have only taken the first step in a long journey to truly meet the three "genetic elements" mentioned above. The characteristics and requirements of a modern water company's monitoring system ultimately lie in acquiring basic data on-site. The new system must cover the company's internal and external networks, including the lowest levels of production activities, and must be fast, accurate, and have excellent integration of process flows online. The system control must be stable, practical, and reliable. 3 Only through scientific information control integration can a modern water company with sustainable development be created. 3.1 Analysis of the Current Status of Automation in China's Water Industry Compared with other system companies, the automation level of traditional Chinese water companies lags behind by about ten years. Before the 1980s, water company monitoring systems were mainly composed of discrete components: various water quality analysis instruments, dosing systems, transmitters, sensors, actuators, and paper recorders for monitoring various parameters of water level, temperature, pressure, flow, and power supply systems. These were bulky, cumbersome, and had low functionality, and were very expensive at the time. The monitoring center could only display a few parameters. Since the 1990s, water plant engineering has undergone several major transformations, including the implementation of PID control, ratio control, feedforward, feedback, FCS, DCS, and the initial Ethernet technology, resulting in significant improvements in automation levels. However, thousands of field devices remain isolated, operating outside the automation system, leading to widespread bottlenecks. Management cannot access online information about the production status of processes in each water plant. Supply chain marketing services and pipeline monitoring also exist in a disconnected state. In the last five years, many large city water companies have built PLC and FCS fieldbus systems, particularly implementing industrial Ethernet technologies. However, data is incomplete, and some transmitted data cannot be shared, resulting in extremely low utilization. Strictly speaking, these cannot be considered true automation systems. This is even more true for many water companies that haven't implemented automation at all. Many engineering designs using industrial Ethernet + TCP/IP monitoring systems primarily operate at the physical, transport, network, and data link layers of the ISO/OSI seven-layer communication model. PLC controllers are mainly used in the field, with very little usage at the application, presentation, and session layers. The various data, both vertically and horizontally, are still not integrated. 3.2 Comparison of FCS and Real-Time Industrial Ethernet for Field Networks It is well known that the FCS field control bus is specifically developed for field communication requirements, basically meeting the real-time requirements of field information transmission. It is easy to use, has strong diagnostic functions, and is more economical, automated, and digital than DCS systems. Its openness is its biggest highlight. However, the FCS field bus cannot handle large-scale data transmission, often employing a master/slave control mode, making it difficult to meet the transmission requirements of the control system. The software technologies developed by different manufacturers are incompatible, preventing bus parallelization and turning them into isolated "islands," causing considerable trouble for uninformed users. Today, real-time industrial Ethernet technology is also widely used in the water industry. Its multi-master, universality, and ability to simultaneously transmit large amounts of data at different rates perfectly complement the shortcomings of various FCS field buses. It basically meets the production management and office system communication requirements of various enterprises in the water industry system. 3.3 The field control network of the water industry must adopt real-time industrial Ethernet. Compared with the 12 commonly used FCS fieldbuses in the past, real-time industrial Ethernet has a series of advantages in addition to those mentioned above. (1) It adopts the recognized TCP/IP communication protocol, and the field layer can easily connect to the Internet to realize seamless link between various companies and many field layer process controls. It is inexpensive, stable and reliable, has a high communication rate, rich software and hardware products, and very mature supporting technology, making it the most popular communication network for process systems. (2) With the rapid development of Fast Ethernet and Transformed Ethernet, the deterministic problem of the early industrial Ethernet has been basically solved. Its communication rate has been continuously improved, from 10Mb/s, 100 Mb/s to 1000Mb/s and 10 Gb/s today. This is an advantage that FCS system cannot match. Under the same data throughput, it means a significant reduction in network load, a greatly reduced probability of network collisions, and improved network determinism. (3) It adopts a star network topology structure, and powerful switches can subdivide the network into several segments. The switches are connected through the backbone network. Switches can filter data transmitted over the network, limiting data transmission between nodes in each segment to the local segment without passing through the backbone. This prevents local data transmission from occupying bandwidth in other segments, thus significantly reducing the network load on all segments and the backbone. (4) With one pair of wires dedicated to sending data and the other pair dedicated to receiving data, this switched full-duplex real-time industrial Ethernet eliminates the problem of data collisions on the network, further improving the reliability and real-time performance of Ethernet communication. (5) Real-time industrial Ethernet has great potential for sustainable development. The monitoring master computer can realize the pipeline GIS geographic monitoring system and numerous remote water intake pumping stations through the Internet. The I/O contacts of the water intake head are seamlessly connected, and modifications, integration, or monitoring and management can be carried out at the master station center or any other place linked on the Internet. 3.4 Utilize Embedded Technology as Much as Possible. Employing embedded technology integrates existing FCS, DCS, PLC, GIS, OAS office automation systems, all field measurement and control systems, and advanced control technologies used in the main process flow (such as future quantitative measurement software, fuzzy neural network technology-based online monitoring dosing systems, and AI simulation closed-loop monitoring systems for wastewater biological waste gas treatment, etc.) into an integrated information control system based on the "Internet + RTE + TCP/IP protocol" model. As is well known, embedded technology will become the fastest-growing IT industry in the 21st century. Embedded systems are application-centric, based on high-end computer technology, and their hardware and software can be arbitrarily customized; they are suitable for dedicated computer systems where application systems have strict requirements for functionality, reliability, cost, size, and other requirements. In other words, they are dedicated computer systems embedded into the object system to realize the functions of control, monitoring, or management of other devices by the main station monitoring system. In the next generation of network equipment, embedded devices will greatly increase, accounting for approximately 70%, and will be connected to the Internet. Experts predict that 2010 will mark the era of embedded Internet, an era that will produce hundreds or even thousands of times more thin servers than the PC era. These thin servers will be able to automatically, in real-time, conveniently, and easily provide any information objects needed online. Embedded systems are an integral part of achieving integrated information control in the water industry. Only by fully adopting embedded systems, completely transforming traditional instruments and meters, and thoroughly upgrading all transmitters, sensors, actuators, valves, and electromechanical products incompatible with integrated information control, can a city's water utility company truly achieve the goal of integrated information control monitoring across the entire company. This requires embedding Internet and Ethernet capabilities into existing field control systems (FCS), PLC systems, DCS systems, or early industrial Ethernet monitoring systems. 3.5 Real-Time Ethernet (RTE) for Integrated Information Control: Water industry engineers can no longer rely solely on FCS fieldbuses in new and expanded water treatment projects. They must instead use real-time industrial Ethernet to build the monitoring center and station-level control networks. In today's water industry, PLC programmable controllers are widely used at the equipment level, and each water treatment plant and its corresponding monitoring center primarily uses Real-Time Ethernet (RTE) + TCP/IP protocol + Internet to build its network. Currently, water industry automation control systems are becoming increasingly complex. For a large water treatment project, the connections between the traditional DCS system, the PLC systems used in the fieldbus, and the MC systems used for closed-loop control require high speed and tight integration. The entire system consists of more independent distributed control units, and the vast number of sensors, drive mechanisms, transmissions, and instruments require virtualization, miniaturization, digitization, intelligence, and networking. However, in the past, these industrial PCs, OPCs, and Ethernet technologies, once embedded in traditional system architectures, could only provide marginal improvements. All PLCs and other controllers remained isolated, controlling only independent data. The six currently popular real-time industrial Ethernet technologies have broken through the barriers of traditional system architectures, laying a solid technical foundation for truly scientific information control systems. These currently popular real-time industrial Ethernet technologies—EtherCAT, Ethernet Powerlink, EPA, PROFINET, MODBUS-IDA, and Ethernet/IP—have undergone extensive R&D to improve real-time network performance. Real-time response times can be achieved in the range of 5-10ms or lower, comparable to, or even faster than, the FCS fieldbus designed specifically for industrial equipment communication. This largely meets the needs of water treatment processes. However, for motion control systems in chemical dosing systems, the ideal response time for nearly a hundred nodes is less than 1ms, with jitter error less than 1µs. Each of these six real-time industrial Ethernet technologies has its own patented technologies. However, for most engineering design and technical personnel, there is still a need for a more practical common standard, so that they won't be at a loss in practical applications like with Fieldbus (FCS). We hope for a real-time industrial Ethernet that provides a standardized programming language system software design platform that everyone adheres to for the entire monitoring system; on this development platform, only a common variable definition and a central database storing all parameters and control functions are needed. This standard software programming technology should be able to simultaneously develop all devices with multiple master stations and multiple terminals, and should also be able to simultaneously debug and install mechanical equipment with numerous parameters, especially field PLC programmable controllers; it should be a unified standard for programming DCS, FCS, IPC, CNC, GIS, OAS, PLC, MC, and SCADA systems; this open modular structure should be oriented towards all industrial field applications, from field mechanical equipment to all equipment in the entire system; this development platform can be either a PLC-based hardware platform or a PC-based software platform. Users are king, and we hope that manufacturers of real-time industrial Ethernet will quickly develop a simpler and more practical new platform that meets the above requirements. 4. Field Network Technology is a Necessary Condition for Realizing Integrated Information Control From small systems to large systems, from single water plants to the centralized monitoring of numerous water treatment projects and pipeline networks of large city water utilities, the design involves the entire system's structural architecture, addressing both global and fundamental issues. In particular, numerous dispersed plant-level field networks, like the neural networks of a human limb, are the source. 4.1 A good field network creates conditions for building new information control systems. New and practical industrial Ethernet can extend the network to the lowest layer of the automation system—various water quality instruments and field equipment. It can not only horizontally integrate field information resources for rapid response but also vertically integrate field information with enterprise management information, establishing a global automation system to achieve accurate diagnosis, timely control, rapid maintenance, remote monitoring, and management services. This can meet the strategic decision-making needs of enterprise leadership and enable timely participation in global competition. 4.2 A good field network lays the foundation for creating a fully digital, open, integrated information control system. A good field network architecture can quickly and scientifically organize basic data into an orderly data set, forming a comprehensive and accurate description of the enterprise's operations. At the higher-level monitoring center, the online application of data sets dedicated to various advanced control technologies in the main process flow can be accurately integrated to achieve the goal of high-precision and high-closed-loop control of the digital system. In the past, process electrical automation experts in water supply and drainage in major cities, with the support of substantial loans and policies, introduced many high-precision water quality analysis instruments, configured expensive industrial control computers, multi-functional databases, and large display panels. They also adopted GIS pipeline monitoring systems, water consumption prediction, closed-loop control of chemical dosage, dissolved oxygen control, PBF artificial neural networks for sewage treatment, and fuzzy control technology for SBR industrial processes in sewage treatment. However, the functional effects were minimal, and the role of these high-precision measurement and control instruments was not truly realized because there was no fully open and effective field network. The precise setting of production process control parameters, production performance, equipment and process status information are all important components of enterprise information, and must be accurately realized online without distance through a field network. This lowest-level control network is at the field control layer, corresponding to the three-layer structure of the control system. See Figure 1. An ideal data structure system must be based on an ideal field network structure to support and promote the growth and development of the company's basic elements. 4.3 Good field network technology opens up a bright future for achieving the company's "life cycle cost." For every water treatment project built, the company's construction costs, maintenance and operation costs, effluent water quality accuracy, environmental pollution improvement costs, and the company's life cycle—from processes to electrical systems, from information to control—must be carefully calculated with a long-term vision. Our constant pursuit is to minimize electricity consumption per unit of water output. A good field network paves the way for achieving this goal. This "life cycle cost," the savings and reductions in project construction costs and long-term operating costs, must be comprehensively compared using scientific figures. With a good field network system, the advantages of resources and information from all sides, both internal and external, can be utilized to maximize the full functionality of field equipment, resulting in the lowest maintenance and operation costs. Generally speaking, long-term operating cost savings far outweigh initial plant construction cost savings. 5. Traditional instrumentation must fully utilize embedded technology to quickly achieve virtualization, digitization, intelligentization, and networking, which is the fundamental guarantee for realizing integrated information control. Tens of millions of field measurement and control instruments, along with their matching transmitters, sensors, and actuators, form the foundation for establishing company-level and plant-level monitoring systems in the water industry. In the early 1980s, an American expert proposed the new idea that "software is the instrument." The core idea of ​​virtual instruments is to leverage the powerful resources of computers, making technologies that originally required dedicated hardware software-based. This aims to minimize system costs and enhance system functionality and flexibility. With the development of IPC technology, Intelligent Virtual Instruments (IVIs) are flourishing both domestically and internationally. Users can automatically generate instrument driver code in web browsers anywhere, automatically checking various process industry field conditions, performing automatic diagnosis, and automatically modifying programming. With powerful simulation capabilities, various test programs can be developed without connecting to actual instruments. More importantly, it combines the advantages of Application-Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) with a reconfigurable computer, allowing flexible configuration of large arrays of Programmable Logic Units (FPGAs). It can also achieve operating speeds hundreds of times faster than general-purpose computers through pipeline-level or even task-level parallel computing. Furthermore, it can randomly and remotely connect to various instruments on the network at high speed as needed. Based on real-time industrial Ethernet technology and the TCP/IP protocol, the field instrument measurement and control network frees instruments from the constraints of a specific computer; instruments can exist independently of the computer. Like all computers at different levels, it can be an independent node on the network, freely and flexibly connected to any point on the Ethernet, meaning it can be accessed by any computer on the Ethernet or the Internet for real-time dynamic online monitoring. The TCP/IP protocol is embedded in the field instruments, transmitting and receiving signals in TCP/IP mode, fully realizing a highly interoperable and open bus standard. Ethernet and TCP/IP protocols are the communication standards for field instrument testing systems. The open internet structure forms the monitoring system architecture for all plant-level (and even company-level WAN monitoring systems), facilitating distributed control and redundancy at each monitoring level. This significantly reduces system failures and enhances the security and stability of the monitoring system. It also strengthens field data processing capabilities and the application of advanced closed-loop control technologies for key processes. A TCP/IP-based field measurement and control system organically connects each networked computer with plant-level instruments. For example, data collected from a plant can be copied multiple times and sent to relevant departments, or measurement results can be periodically sent to a remote database for storage and access at any time. Even users in different locations can simultaneously monitor the same process. While the performance of instruments and computer hardware and software resources connected to the Ethernet network may vary greatly, once a network environment is established, different tasks can be assigned to computers with different functions, and instruments with different functions can be uniformly accessed, thus optimizing the network system's performance. Different users can collect, analyze, and modify data online from anywhere on the network. Plant-level Ethernet can effectively connect computers and instruments of various functions to the Internet to form a company-level, Internet-based integrated automated monitoring system. 6. Conclusion With the rapid development of IT technology, virtual technology, embedded technology, network technology, high-end industrial control computer technology, and advanced control technology, and with the continuous improvement of industrial automation systems, and considering the experiences and lessons learned from domestic and international water industry construction, automated monitoring systems are facing a revolution. Adopting Internet technology allows centralized automation systems to truly become network control systems with distributed intelligence. From the above-mentioned genetic elements and requirements for automation systems, it is necessary to clarify the concepts and practices that have been circulating for decades. In the 1970s, the Japanese proposed the concept of "MECHATRONIC," or "mechatronics." Due to the characteristics of the machinery manufacturing industry, it organically integrated electrical products, emphasizing the integration of mechanics and electricity, causing a revolution in the machinery manufacturing industry and also affecting the water industry and other industries. However, it did not solve the communication problems of multiple machines and multiple controls, nor the data transmission problems of monitoring. Once upon a time, my country's IT experts proposed the concept of "integrated control and management," but it only focused on information exchange between the control and management layers, neglecting how to improve the real-time performance and determinism of industrial control system transmission. In particular, it overlooked the crucial issues of data acquisition and accurate transmission at the field level. It's hard to imagine how a control system can make correct judgments if the management layer cannot obtain timely and accurate real-time data from the field. "Mechatronics" is a concept proposed by mechanical engineers, while "integrated control and management" is a concept proposed by IT engineers. Based on the aforementioned "genetic elements" and the requirements for automated monitoring systems, our automation system engineers believe that the only correct approach is to create a new type of "integrated information and control." The key to achieving "integrated information and control" is to adopt a new type of monitoring system, namely, a "Programmable Logic Controller (PAC) control system." See Figure 2. The PAC system integrates the advantages of DCS, MC, PLC, and FCS, concentrating elements of multiple control systems on a single platform, while also giving greater consideration to the connection with field applications. Information flows smoothly both vertically and horizontally, minimizing the time required to integrate management, control, and field levels with other network systems both inside and outside the enterprise. This enables uninterrupted communication and exchange across the network. In essence, the PAC system is an organic and flexible combination of the Internet, RTE, and TCP/IP protocols. "The network is the controller." We must grasp the core technologies of modern enterprise automation systems and develop new types of controllers, such as PLC Open. Developing new integrated information control systems will significantly enhance the competitiveness of traditional water enterprises, securing their place in the wave of economic globalization. References [1] Miao Xueqin. Latest developments in real-time Ethernet technology. Beijing: Electrical Age, 2005.6 [2] Lin Yue, Zhang Yancheng. Embedded systems promote the development of industrial control. 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