Safety

It is only through the precise measurement and analysis of the voltage-current-time relationship of every individual cell that the earliest possible detection of all probable electrolyzer malfunctions can be achieved. Hazardous situations can therefore be avoided by enabling an emergency shutdown of the individual power supplies, preventing irreversible damage to equipment and personal injuries.

The specialized alarm algorithms programmed into the EMOS hardware have been developed based on an extensive HAZOP study using data from over 40,000 cells. EMOS’ proprietary design can also help prevent significant damages caused by slowly evolving malfunctions, such as: insufficient electrolyte feed, failing temperature control, etc.

The system installation is specifically designed and optimized for electrolyzers. The software is pre-configured for each installation prior to commissioning. Costs are further reduced by storing data in the EMOS database and not through the DCS, where each additional stored point usually incurs additional charges.

DEDICATED HARDWARE

EMOS achieves the most precise and reliable level of electrolyzer monitoring available on the market through its patented hardware design for data acquisition, transmission and safety interlock functions.

The MODA Assembly measures individual cell voltages. It can measure up to 32 voltages with an unrivaled ±1.5mV precision over temperature. It also incorporates noise filtering algorithms that remove characteristic electrolyzer and rectifier noise to obtain the most accurate measurements possible.

At the heart of the safety system, the SFOCOM is the logic solver that communicates with the MODAs to collect the voltage data and apply the advanced detection algorithms in order to determine if the process should be stopped due to a malfunction. The SFOCOM constantly monitors the hardware with self-diagnostics to ensure that the required safety level is met.

The hardware meets the following safety standards:

• TÜV Certified to IEC 61010-1:2001 Safety requirements for electrical equipment for measurement, control and laboratory use: 600V CAT III, 1000V CAT II.
• Designed to SIL-2 as per IEC 61508 Functional safety of electrical/electronic/programmable electronic safety-related systems.
• ATEX compliant (Ex model) to IEC 60079-15:2007 non-sparking (nA), zone 2, class T1, explosion group IIC.

EMOS MONITORING

This software suite is designed for the monitoring and management of process data obtained from the EMOS single voltage monitoring system, or any other OPC compliant application equipment. It offers:

• A completely customizable user interface for monitoring of plant operations.
• Alarm notifications and cell voltage reporting which can be monitored using a graphical interface for trending and easy analysis of individual or grouped elements.

The software suite features:

• A data access server.
• An alarm and event server.
• A historian data access server.
• An operator view.
• A pre-processing capability that provides, for each electrolyzer, calculated tags such as: normalized voltages, k-factor, average, and sum calculation.
• OPC Gateway (mirror).

When combined with the voltage monitoring hardware, EMOS MONITORING provides users with all the required tools to safely operate the plant electrolyzers while reducing maintenance costs.

Single Element Temperature Evaluation

Through research and modeling, EMOS MONITORING is able to provide real-time calculated individual cell temperatures to protect against boiling conditions. The user can set alarms to indicate if one or more electrolyzer cells are operating outside of their safe temperature ranges preventing membrane damage and reducing maintenance and operating costs.

Pinhole Detector

EMOS MONITORING includes a tool for the automatic detection, and classification by severity, of membrane pinholes. The tool detects electrolyzer start-up and shutdown conditions within which to perform its pinhole analysis and provides alarm notifications to the operator.

The Startup and Landing Module identifies membranes with early-stage pinholes, providing a close follow up on these elements to minimize their effect on coating degradation and production loss. The user can then efficiently manage membrane replacement during a planned shutdown.