Distributed process monitoring and control using FPGA

This paper presents a system to implement a process monitoring and control system on FPGA in order to replace PLC´s from any industrial environment. The system implemented contains slave nodes being monitored and controlled through a single master node connected to a PC. This enables the centralized control of any industrial environment with plants distributed on considerable distances. The master FPGA is implemented in order to reduce the load from the PC as it collects the data from all the slaves over a wireless link. Wireless links provide possibility of long distance control. It can be a simple RF transceivers or a GSM modem. The slave FPGA collects data from different sensors and processes them in order to calculate the desired actuator response to control the respective parameters. These limits, with in which the parameters are to be limited, are sent on the wireless link from the master to individual Slave and gets updated using the GUI on the PC. The advantage of using FPGA is that they can be programmed in system without the need of detaching it from the system. This feature gives an advantage over a PLC which requires disconnection from the system when the internal programming needs to be changed. The only disadvantage was that the separate power switching circuits were designed for power switching. It is observed that the control and monitoring was possible in real time due to high data rate and the values were controlled well within the limits defined by the user.