Originally published in Financial Times Partner Content
Untapped data: the most underexploited industrial resource
In pursuit of a more sustainable future, Industry 4.0 is at the forefront of helping industry – the largest contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions – decrease its energy intensity and integrate more renewable energy sources into operations.
Technology is at the core of enabling safe, smart and sustainable industrial operations, and digital solutions are performing an increasingly important role. Industrial Internet of Things (IoT) – a network of software-enabled and cloud-connected devices and technologies – is becoming a key part of the equation, helping businesses tackle decarbonisation challenges.
“We are in the age of digital transformation, with Industrial IoT solutions providing insights into industrial processes like never before,” says Peter Terwiesch, president of the Process Automation business at ABB. “The potential of digital solutions to enable more sustainable industrial operations is vast, but effective application is key. Simply accumulating operational data isn’t enough; it’s the advanced analytics and artificial intelligence, grounded by domain and process expertise, that truly make the difference.”
Untapped information about industrial operations is one of the most underexploited resources companies have to address energy security and sustainability, notes Terwiesch. “We’ve seen that only around 20 percent of the data industrial companies produce is used, and even less is analysed. Successful companies will not only gather data; they will analyse it to gain insights to make better operational decisions and take even faster actions, ultimately achieving better outcomes for their businesses, society, and the planet.”
Industrial transformation’s new imperative
To understand how it can better support its customers’ sustainability goals, ABB asked over 700 key decision-makers across 12 industrial segments about how their businesses will address digital transformation while advancing sustainability.
The survey revealed1 a clear connection between digital technologies and sustainability, highlighting the eagerness of surveyed companies to harness Industrial IoT technologies.
Three quarters of respondents said they are increasing investment in Industrial IoT to address sustainability, while 96 percent said that they view these technologies as essential to addressing sustainability ambitions. Technologies considered most critical to improving sustainability included advanced analytics, cloud computing and cybersecurity.
These findings show that industrial transformation’s new imperative is to apply digitalisation to boost business and sustainability goals. Digital solutions are an important part of the sustainability toolbox, but there is still work to be done to realise the full potential of these technologies.
Supporting energy efficiency and renewable integration
Digital solutions and Industrial IoT technologies help enable what Terwiesch calls the greenest energy of all: energy that is not used. For example, connected sensors and analytics can monitor energy use to identify and immediately address energy waste in a manufacturing process.
Digitalisation also supports increasing the share of renewable energy in industrial processes. When it comes to relying on renewables to power industrial operations, the main challenge is the intermittency of supply, such as depending on wind for wind turbines and sunlight for solar panels. Industrial IoT systems can note an intermittency coming from a power source, or any other kind of disturbance, and within milliseconds switch to more stable power supply, or shed non-essential loads so that power continues to critical processes. This ensures safety and prevents plant shutdown.
Securing a greener future
Despite the leap in adoption of digitalisation during the COVID-19 pandemic, it has not yet reached its full potential in most industries. According to ABB’s survey, only 35 percent of customers have implemented Industrial IoT at scale.
“To stand a chance of achieving net-zero, digitalisation technologies must be put to use immediately, at scale,” says Terwiesch. “We must accelerate the adoption of digital solutions and identify and overcome obstacles that impede their implementation.”
While technology gathers and applies the data necessary to know more and do better for both business and the environment, people developing these technologies are even more important. For it is the insights of people developing technologies that make them easy to understand and implement by users – paramount for successful adoption.
