OPC Unified Architecture (OPC UA) and the DeltaV system

OPC UA is a platform-independent standard that enables secure communication between control systems, devices, and enterprise software. It is especially suited to manufacturing and process control applications.

Communication works on a clients/server model. Each client can interact concurrently with one or more servers. Each server can interact concurrently with one or more clients.

OPC UA server data is stored in an address space. Each entity in the address space is a node. Servers provide clients with type definitions to enable the clients to read the address space structure. Clients typically provide a user interface that enables users to identify the specific node variables that they want the client to read or write to. Address spaces can contain real-time data, alarms and events, and history.

DeltaV systems provide extensive support for OPC UA. DeltaV software:

Enables third-party OPC UA clients to read DeltaV real-time, historic, and alarm and event data.
Enables DeltaV OPC UA clients to read data from third-party devices, systems and software. Typically, a DeltaV OPC UA client reads data from a third-party OPC UA server and writes the data to a DeltaV module.

OPC UA security is based on digital certificates. The security model includes encryption, authentication and auditing to ensure that data going into your system is authenticated and data going out is secure.

You can configure the following DeltaV nodes as OPC UA servers:

ProfessionalPLUS workstation
Application workstation
PK controller

You can configure the following nodes as DeltaV OPC UA clients:

ProfessionalPLUS workstation
Application workstation
Ethernet I/O card (EIOC)

An OPC UA activation license is required for OPC UA servers and clients in workstations. This is a one-time and system wide license that activates all the OPC UA servers and clients in all the Application stations and ProfessionalPLUS workstations in the system. Once the OPC UA activation license is present, the OPC UA server consumes licenses from classic OPC servers (DA, A&E and HDA). These licenses will be shared with OPC Classic and OPC UA clients. For example: If you have an application station with a 10000 OPC DA Classic license, you can have one OPC UA client and one OPC DA client each consuming 5,000 signals.

Note

OPC UA workstation clients and servers are for monitoring and non-critical control. The system does not set overall module integrity (OINTEG) to BAD due to module slippage.

Note

All OPC UA clients and servers in your OPC UA application require a common time source to remain functional. You can use NTP or an equivalent. This includes DeltaV clients and servers and third-party clients and servers regardless of platform type or operating system.