Proposta de um sistema de supervisão e controle de tanques acoplados

Abstract

The use of technological resources for process control and production cost reduction has become increasingly important in industrial automation, and the use of programmable logic controllers (PLC) and supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems is becoming more and more indispensable. These technologies facilitate the development of control systems in a faster and more efficient way, whether in the automation of industrial processes or in bench top plants in the teaching of engineering disciplines. However, when different manufacturers are involved, direct communication is not possible due to the use of different communication protocols. This barrier is solved by the OPC communication protocol, which allows interoperability between the different supplier systems. In this work we proposed the integration of a MATLAB simulation platform with a PLC for the control of liquid levels in a coupled tank system, using PID control in a Siemens PLC S7-1200, from a plant modeled in MATLAB Simulink, in which the communication between the PLC and MATLAB was done through an OPC server KEPServerEX.V4. The purpose was to extend resources for didactic plant control projects, helping in the teaching-learning process of Computer Engineering students. The results showed that the system controlled via PLC has a good response, maintaining control even when facing setpoint variations. Furthermore, the developed HMI provides a tool for real-time supervision of a coupled tank control system, integrating different software and technologies in a single process, and can also be scaled to other types of plants.