OT Energy Management via IT-to-OT Command Mapping
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Industrial automation systems in operational technology (OT) environments lack effective tools for dynamically monitoring and controlling electrical power consumption, leading to inefficiencies and potential high energy costs.
Innovation Solution
A container orchestration system integrates with industrial control systems, using an edge appliance to map information technology (IT) commands to operation technology (OT) commands, enabling the control of OT devices to adjust their operational modes and reduce electrical power consumption based on API calls from external utilities.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If industrial control systems operate continuously to manage OT devices, then operational reliability is maintained, but electrical power consumption increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system implements periodic monitoring of electrical power consumption by external APIs at specified time windows, and periodically adjusts OT device operations during these windows to reduce consumption while maintaining overall operational reliability through continuous control system operation
Solution Approach 2:
The system dynamically adjusts the operational modes of OT devices based on real-time power consumption monitoring and external API requests, allowing the control system to flexibly modify device operations during specific time windows to reduce energy consumption while maintaining reliability when needed
2Extent of automation
If IT commands are implemented directly on OT devices, then energy management control is achieved, but system complexity increases due to protocol mapping requirements
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an intermediary layer that translates IT commands into OT commands, allowing automated energy management control to be achieved without directly complicating the OT device infrastructure. This intermediary handles the protocol mapping and command translation, isolating the complexity from the core OT devices while maintaining high automation capability
Data Source
AI summary
An industrial automation system is described including multiple devices, a master container node, a container node, and a control system. The devices may connect to an external application programming interface (API) of an external device (e.g., an electric power utility company), receive an API call from the external API indicative of a time window for monitoring electrical power consumption of the devices by the external API, and output one or more information technology (IT) commands in response to receiving the API call. The container node may be coupled to the master container node, wherein the container node may map the IT commands to operation technology (OT) commands. The control system may be coupled to the container node and the plurality of devices. The control system may implement the OT commands on the devices to perform one or more operations.