You just can’t hold back a good homebrew, especially when it comes from Mother Earth—Mother Earth Brew Companythat is. The San Diego, Calif., craft beer company started in a garage in 2008, expanded into a family business in 2010, grew into a second local tap house in 2012, and is now expanding into a new production facility in Nampa, Idaho.
这种绿地扩展到40,000平方英尺。空间始于2016年，建立了一个四个罐系统，包括捣碎的混合器，劳格屯，酿造水壶和漩涡罐。还有一个集成的清洁原位（CIP）系统 - 其中罐体可以清洁自己 - 以及发酵控制和明亮的啤酒控制。
Craft Brewer与Paul Mueller Co.进行了自动化安装的过程工程和石材技术。为了满足公司的需求，工程师和集成商所需的是建立灵活，可靠性，以及可重复的过程所需的控制系统。
“我们有七种不同的品牌，但我们的投资组合包括12个月的时间范围内的60到70个不同的啤酒，”母亲地球酿造有限公司的Head Brewer表示，他在突破会议期间提出Rockwell Automation’s Process Solutions User Group (PSUG)earlier this month. Due to the variety of flavors, the system needed to be able to run multiple batches on a process skid. “We might start with an IPA and then a Cali Creamin [ale] back to back.”
Just as important was ease of use as there would be no system programmer working on day-to-day operations. In other words, brew masters would have to be able to control a process with no understanding of PLC programming.
为了适应地球的酿造需求，罗克韦尔自动化的PlantPax分布式控制系统（DCS）部署了。在PSUG期间，Rockwell高管将PlantPax称为“现代DCS”，这意味着它基于流程，离散和安全控制的集成架构，利用商业服务器和以太网/ IP进行开放通信，并可通过各种架构进行可扩展适用于应用程序的右键控件。
地球母亲应用程序,具体地说,使用年代equencer Object, a controller-based step sequencing system that allows sequences to be configured directly through a standard interface without requiring code changes. This reduces engineering time for system integrators, while increasing process repeatability for end users. In addition, the system included Batch Scheduler to schedule brews ahead of time, as well as other parameter values for non-brew operations, like CIP.
该系统符合公司的灵活性需求，并保持仔细控制热水和冷坦克之间的水箱温度，压力和水平衡。批量编号创建是为了报告历史数据，使用罗克韦尔配置工具的Stone创建了实际运行进程的参考图表。
The benefits of PlantPAx is that it keeps end users involved from start to finish. “We started the system up in a week and Chris took over with no programming or automation experience,” said Ryan Williams, project manager at Stone Technologies. “With the tools that Rockwell created and [tools] we have created ourselves, it creates consistency and a structured program.”
