Towards advanced concurrency, distribution, integration, and openness of a power plant distributed control system (DCS)

The basics of a distributed control system (DCS) for power plant applications are reviewed, considering progress in hardware, software, and networking. The state-of-the-art computing network is briefly described, and each level of the DCS is investigated. The peripheral intelligence, the field bus, the decision level of the DCS, new aspects of distribution, integration, openness, and standardization are discussed. A comparison between the power and manufacturing industries concerning requirements and application issues of DCSs is made in order to emphasize the differences in requirement and application of control systems to these industries