Virtualização de uma planta industrial para automatização de processos e experimentação remota

Abstract

The virtual commissioning of process automation represents a crucial advancement for Industry 4.0, enabling faster and more accurate configuration of automated systems, which significantly reduces implementation costs and timelines. This work focused on the virtualization and automation of an industrial plant for part separation and machining. The central hypothesis of this study was to investigate the feasibility of performing an industrial plant simulation in a virtual environment that communicates in real-time with physical equipment and generates data for acquisition by a supervisory system. The expectation is that, in addition to reducing manufacturing time, process automation will also result in substantial financial gains, primarily due to the reduction or elimination of human operators in the plant. The overall objective of the project was to automate an industrial process in virtual reality controlled by a programmable logic controller (PLC), supervised and interactive through a human-machine interface (HMI). To achieve this objective, it was necessary to virtualize the industrial plant using Factory I/O software, program the PLC and HMI to automate the process, establish communication between the equipment for virtual commissioning, and conduct practical experimentation in the laboratory. The results of this project include the successful implementation of an automated industrial process in a virtual reality environment. The use of Factory I/O provided a realistic and controlled simulation environment, allowing for testing and validation of automation processes before real implementation. Effective communication between different software components, ensured by the OPC protocol, guarantees seamless integration of all system components. The remote validation of the automated system provided by the simulation confirms the efficiency and effectiveness of the process.