EAM Solutions Stretch Capabilities of Lean Plant Maintenance Teams
The post EAM Solutions Stretch Capabilities of Lean Plant Maintenance Teams appeared first on POWER Magazine.
Of the many challenges power and industrial plant maintenance teams face, stretching the capabilities of their ultra-lean staff is one of the most critical. Assets can range from industrial generators, to warehouse forklifts, overhead doors, corridor lighting, and on-premise security systems. Unexpected downtime can be disastrous—and costly.
To prevent operational failures or delays, technicians as part of enterprise asset management (EAM) teams must possess broad skills and be well-prepared to handle numerous types of service calls, from power outages to valve failures or pipeline cracks. With budgets stretched thin and a shortage of skilled maintenance technicians, the challenges compound. However, technology can help the maintenance team work smarter, not harder—the key to modern plant maintenance.
Defining the Problem
The power industry, like many others, is facing a severe skills gap. Experienced service technicians are difficult to recruit. Retiring baby boomers are leaving gaps that incoming millennials and Generation Z workers cannot (or will not) fill.…
Protecting Critical Infrastructure from Drone Intrusions
The post Protecting Critical Infrastructure from Drone Intrusions appeared first on POWER Magazine.
Drones represent a classic good news/bad news scenario. The good news is great. The bad news is terrifying.
On the good news front, drones can keep utility-sector workers safely on the ground, with the machines performing aerial inspections at a fraction of what it would cost to do with manned aircraft. They provide faster, easier inspection of boilers, stacks, towers, and other infrastructure.
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1. Drones—unmanned aerial vehicles—are often used to conduct inspections and collect data from power generation sites, and transmission and distribution assets. But they also can pose a security risk with their ability to intrude upon areas humans are not able to access. Courtesy: S. Hermann and F. Richter / Pixabay |
The bad news? Drones (Figure 1) represent an enormous threat across the energy sector—from production to distribution.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security notes: “There are 16 critical infrastructure sectors whose assets, systems, and networks, whether physical or virtual, are considered so vital to the United States that their incapacitation or destruction would have a debilitating effect on security, national economic security, national public health or safety, or any combination thereof.”…
Using Extreme Visibility to Protect Industrial Control Systems [PODCAST]
The post Using Extreme Visibility to Protect Industrial Control Systems [PODCAST] appeared first on POWER Magazine.
What does it mean to have “extreme visibility” in an operational technology (OT) environment? According to Claroty, a New York-based company that offers cybersecurity products for industrial control systems, it’s having the ability to see all assets on a network, knowing what they are, and understanding what functions they perform. The company says the more organizations know about their OT network assets, the better equipped they will be to detect and investigate suspicious behavior.
“In order to really understand how to protect these networks, you really have to have your finger on the pulse of the threat landscape,” Dave Weinstein, Chief Security Officer with Claroty, said as a guest on The POWER Podcast.
“With respect to industrial control systems, nation-state actors continue to monopolize, if you will, the threat landscape. That is to say that the barriers to entry are sufficiently high enough at this point to prevent your average script kiddie or high school hacker from doing serious damage to, for example, the electrical grid,” Weinstein said.…