iSiTEC is one of the partners of Water2REturn consortium and is specialized in electronic and automation. They have three main business units:

• Development of scientific devices
• Industrial automation
• System and electronic development

Scientific devices are focused for measuring and observing the environment. An example is an underwater camera system to make photos of microorganisms, so the scientist find out which species are the living in the explored area. The picture below shows the system and some picture made with it.

Their role in the Water2Return project

Because they are always looking for opportunities to work on environmentally friendly technologies, they took the chance to be involved in the project.

Their rule in the project is the development of the control system(s). This task persists to following subtasks:

• Direct control of the main components (SBR and buffer tanks) of the water line
• Control of the subsystems for the water line e.g., reverse osmosis. These subsystems have their own control unit provided by the suppliers, but they are connected to the overall control system which gives e.g., start stop commands
• Direct control of the digester for biogas production
• Visualization of all systems and subsystems
• Data logging
• Network layout and setup

The design of the system based on a decentralized philosophy sticked together in a network. The design and setup of this network is a fundamental important task within the control system development. The network was designed to be accessible remotely as well locally. Security issues for that kind of network are also highly important. The remote access is realized with an industrial VPN-portal (VPN = Virtual Private Network) which gives a high level of security. For the locally access two WLAN access point have been installed so you can access the network of any place at the plant.

With access to the network, remotely or locally, you can observe and control the overall process. Further for testing purposes you can turn the most devices in a manual mode and turn them on and off. The locally access makes testing very comfortable because you can operate a device with a smartphone or laptop when you are at the device place.

To get an impression of the system below some picture from the visualization, the electrical installations, and an overview picture from the network.