One year for GE Energy CAC

GE Energy’s Optimization and Control business celebrated the first anniversary of its Asia Customer Application Center (CAC) in July. Located in Singapore, the CAC provides product demonstrations, training, and simulations to enable process industry customers to see how GE products and services can improve plant productivity.

Hitesh Shah, Regional Leader for Optimization and Control, announced that the CAC has served more than 200 customers from across Asia in the 12 months since inception. Recent seminars have included Advanced Compressor Diagnostics in April, and Performance Monitoring and Optimization in June.

Latest investments at the facility include the Mark Vie turbine control system and the OC4000 DCS.

“The expertise that GE has acquired over the past 50 years is what sets us apart from our competitors, giving us an edge in offering customized solutions to our clients,” said Shah.

Growing industrial and construction activity in Asia is expected to boost demand for its GE Energy’s products services, which include control systems, condition monitoring, and oil & gas exploration technologies.

New innovations

At the specially held press conference to mark the anniversary, GE Energy also revealed a number of new innovations.

The Knowledge3 (KN3) neural net technology d e l i v e rs complex optimization for power industry applications.

Its core application is fossil-fired boiler optimization; improving efficiency, increasing availability and reducing emissions simultaneously.

And Stefan Bakenhaus, Product Line Leader, Bentley Nevada, revealed new wireless condition monitoring solutions for distributed plant assets. The wireless Sensor Interface Module (wSIM) comprises a dual sensor for vibration and temperature monitoring, utilizes mesh topology compatible with emerging ISA standards, plus power options that include a power harvesting micro generator as well as battery. The potential for wireless technology in condition monitoring is “very exciting”, according to Bakenhaus. wSIM industrial trials have been ongoing since the start of the year and commercial product launch is targeted for Q4 2007.

Stefan Bakenhaus