controlmonitoring

Control monitoring, sometimes written as controlmonitoring, refers to the ongoing observation and assessment of the performance, health, and safety of control systems and the processes they regulate. It combines measurement, data analysis, and diagnostics to ensure control loops maintain desired outputs, stay within specifications, and operate safely. It covers automatic controllers, such as PID and model predictive controllers, and the health of sensors, actuators, networks, and power supplies.

Core activities include collecting process data from sensors and historians, detecting deviations or drift, performing fault detection and diagnostics, and monitoring loop performance indicators such as gain, offset, and dynamic response. Techniques include statistical process control, trend analysis, anomaly detection, and model-based diagnostics. Tools typically integrate with SCADA, DCS, PLCs, historians, and analytics platforms.

Applications span manufacturing, chemical processing, energy utilities, building automation, and transportation. Effective control monitoring improves reliability, safety, regulatory compliance, and enables predictive maintenance and reduced downtime. Challenges include data quality and timeliness, false alarms, managing multi-loop interactions, and cybersecurity risks.

Standards and practices emphasize safety, reliability, and operational integrity for control systems. Related concepts include fault detection and diagnosis, condition monitoring, and predictive maintenance.