Until recently, many compressor operators considered black boxes the best available technology to maintain consistent compressor control, despite the technology's many drawbacks. Chief among those are: 1) the lack of interoperability with other plant controls, 2) the difficulty of quickly accessing critical operating data, 3) the need for specialized tools to maintain or expand compressor control systems and 4) the demand for more redundancy and energy efficiency.Today, a growing number are abandoning black boxes for programmable automation controllers (PACs), taking advantage of their state-of-the-art, high-performance capabilities. PACs combine the features and capabilities of a PC-based control system with that of a typical programmable logic controller (PLC), as well as advanced digital technologies, such as Ethernet/IP and predictive modeling analytics. In addition to eliminating the need for isolated, complicated and often proprietary black boxes, these open, "generic" platforms provide integrated network connectivity, more precise compressor control and easier scalability.
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