Will ISA take the wrong path yet again?

Automation engineers who have been fortunate enough to spend a portion of their careers in the areas of process, discrete, hybrid and IT are relatively rare. I am one who has enjoyed this variety of experience, which leads me and many of my colleagues with similar experiences to view the P&ID as equally important to each area. In my view, no automation project should be without a P&ID. A whole consulting industry grew up around taking P&ID concepts and applying them to business. This was called business process mapping. Nevertheless, the P&ID is frequently overlooked, especially in automation projects like packaging lines. ISA is in a special position to have a constructive influence on this, but will they?

ISA's latest name is the International Society of Automation. The I no longer stands for instrument. That is a change that was far too long coming. In the 70's and 80's I was active in ISA and served as a Division Director of the then fastest growing division, Food and Pharmaceutical Industries. Despite our growth, I and many others were frustrated with ISA's instrumentation and continuous process focus in a world that was being dominated by PLC's, computers and automation. I eventually moved on, as have many other ISA members.

Beginning in the late 80's, OMAC provided an opportunity for hybrid and discrete groups to come together to advocate for their particular needs and to develop some industry consensus. When OMAC came under the management of ISA's Automation Federation initiative in 2006, ISA found itself in the best position yet to act upon the expanded mission as indicated in the latest rendition of its name.

Unfortunately, I still see ISA acting more as an instrumentation society for continuous process industries. As I browsed through the latest edition of Intech, I took note of a feature article on an initiative to harmonize ANSI/ISA-5.1 Instrumentation Symbols and Identification with the Process Industries Practices of the Construction Industries Institute to create a P&ID standard as ISA5.7. I don't hear the words automation or packaging machinery anywhere in this discussion.

ISA took a baby step in allowing the PackML initiative to surface as a technical report under the S88 committee. If ISA is to be relevant in the 21st century, it must adopt a new paradigm focused on global automation, not just North American-style process instrumentation. ISA5.7 presents another opportunity for ISA to change its path. I'm not holding my breath.

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Comments That says it all. That is what I see also. Posted by: Paul Zepf on December 18, 2009 Hello Keith, I have taken the liberty of linking to your excellent blog in my latest contribution to the "Our ISA" site. You will find it in my blog Trends & Fulfillments. Thank you for caring enough to discuss the Society and its future. Posted by: Eoin Ó Riain on December 19, 2009 That says it all. That is what I see also. You will find it in my blog Trends & Fulfillments. Thank you for caring enough to discuss the Society and its future. _________________________________ Whiteblack Posted by: Personal ISA on June 25, 2010 Post a comment (If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.) Name: Email Address: URL: Remember personal info? Comments: (you may use HTML tags for style) Type the word 'packaging' (required):