Benefits of HART Communication-Enabled Gas and Flame Detectors

Catastrophic results can occur when a fire or a flammable/toxic gas release goes undetected in any petrochemical facility. For early warning and prompt hazard mitigation, flame detectors and gas detectors are essential tools. Clear, usable, diagnostic information from these detection instruments is extremely valuable in ensuring the devices are properly maintained, tested, and poised to protect the people, equipment, and facility in the event of an unexpected release of flammable hydrocarbons.

The method and the means by which a fire or gas detection instrument communicates diagnostic information to appropriate systems and personnel is the topic of this article. In particular, the HART protocol
implementation is described.

The open HART protocol improves the flow of diagnostic information from process instruments including optical flame detectors and combustible /toxic gas detectors. A number of manufacturers have recently released detectors with HART protocol including their Device Descriptions (DD) files that are registered at the HART Communication Foundation. This approach ensures that end-users receive smart detectors that are completely interoperable and can be fully integrated with other HART-enabled devices and systems.

Advances in Flame and Gas Detection Deliver Useful Information
In the past decade, flame and gas detection has improved due to numerous technological advancements including overall sensitivity, device accuracy and precision, false-alarm rejection, elimination of undisclosed/covert failures, and general reliability.

A number of global approval agencies including Factory Mutual (FM), Canadian Standards Association (CSA), and others have now documented performance criteria for hazard detection system certifications, providing a level of assurance to the end-user that the equipment has been tested and certified by an independent 3rd party.

In addition to these performance advancements, useful diagnostic information is also available to the user from some smart detectors. Information can include detector sensitivity settings, setup/configuration data, calibration logs, event logs, device documentation, and real-time sensor “health” information.