The first challenge, and some would say most difficult, was to investigate the practicalities of producing a UK water industry standard protocol for field device to telemetry master system data communication. Our objective is: "To evolve current technologies to a point where any remote field device is able to communicate with any telemetry system, facilitated through the use of a defined set of communication standards and protocols." As a result of this work any approved field device will be able to communicate with any approved telemetry master system and vice versa. Consequently purchasers will have much more freedom, having purchased a telemetry system, to select from a wide variety of field devices for use on their systems, eliminating costly protocol emulations and at the same time promoting competition. The concept is not a new one, the electrical power industry having adopted the DNP3 standard a decade ago and both purchases and vendors having seen significant benefits deriving from this standardisation. Progress: We are pleased to report that, although it has indeed been a difficult challenge for us all, we are making significant progress now towards successful completion of the project. We expect type-approved products will become available in the latter part of 2009. Yes we recognise timescales have slipped significantly, however we have managed to keep to the original user investment budget and all the original benefits are still there for you to unlock for your organisation. Our journey to date: For the development of the standard protocol, stage 1 was to capture and agree a common understanding of what functionality each Water Management Organisation (WMO) expected from both the master system and a range of field device types. This was a first for our industry with members freely discussing investment profiles and planning for the next 5 years and beyond. Having defined the functional requirement, stage 2 was to carry out a feasibility study to explore the range of possibilities and similar industry models. As a result the team recommended the adoption of the DNP3 standard, which would be suitably enhanced for the water industry through the development of a series of Application Notes. Stage 3 was to design this series of Application Notes in order to define the rules under which the DNP3 protocol may be used so as to achieve the functional requirements and interoperability between multi-vendor equipment. The final stage, and not surprisingly the most difficult, was to take the Application Notes and ask a select group of vendors to develop their equipment to meet the new standard as described in the Application Notes. This was a vital part of the process - to test that the Application Notes could provide sufficient detail to permit real applications of the standard. As you might expect this has proved to be quite difficult - the applications notes initially proved to be over-complex and difficult to achieve in practice, mainly due to attempting to incorporate too many options for different ways of working. In addition there were no formal contracts in place with the 6 vendors. Therefore it was difficult to co-ordinate common development areas, resulting in the pace of this development being very slow with vendors paid work taking priority over WITS development. Clearly things needed to change: During the summer of 2007 the management team and vendors worked hard to redefine the Application Notes to make them more suitable for practical implementation with minimal loss of functionality. At a meeting on the 31st January 2008 the team finally agreed the technical details of the Application Notes. The documentation was then revised and re-issued for sign-off in April 2008. A new way of working: With the new drive to improve the Application Notes, the Vendors agreed to work more closely together and agreed a joint programme for development. Tony Ciardiello of the Schneider Group has been instrumental in co-ordinating the vendor group and arranged a series of ‘Plug Fests'. These plug fests provide the opportunity for all 6 vendors to come together and carry out a series of practical tests to check correct implementation of the standard and product interoperability. The first plug fest set out to prove that all equipment met the DNP3 level 2 standard - this being the foundation of the WITS implementation between equipment types. The next was held on 29 April 2008 and started to look at the implementation of the Application Notes, focussing on this occasion on health checks and call-back data sets. A further series of events have been held throughout the summer, leading to the formal test phase of the project. This will lead to type approval of the products that the vendors have been using for development, followed by formal release of the Application Notes to the general market. In order to cope with the significant delays to the programme the WITS management team has had to take a close look at its supporting role in order to avoid the need to ask for more funding from the WMOs. As a result the WITS management team will continue to oversee the protocol development and will now meet every 2- 3 months or so as required. However a Project Board of 3 members - Malcolm Tyler (Grontmij), Simon Harrison (Anglian Water Services) and Martin Pritchard (Severn Trent Water) - has been set up to provide close support to the vendors in order to deal with technical issues as they arise. It has been agreed that they will attend the plug fests to give user clarification and monitor progress. This is followed by a formal Project Board meeting in the afternoon where general project management issues can be discussed. Whilst still reporting to the management team, this increased commitment and revised approach is proving to be beneficial and the project remains within the management team budget. Latest Position: Regrettably on the 15th April 2008, Metasphere (Logica) notified the WITS management team of their decision to withdraw from the project. They were developing a compliant master system ‘top end' but decided to suspend development in this area, directing instead their development funding to other areas of their business. Metasphere have however assured the WITS management team that they will continue to develop funded work on WITS-DNP3, and while concentrating on DNP3 in the short term they still have WITS-DNP3 in their development programme for 2009. It should be recognised the significant contribution Metasphere has made to the development of the WITS protocol to date and we look forward to them applying for type approval in the future. Although significant it should be noted that in the early days of the project the management team set down its success criteria for the project and this anticipated such an event. The project therefore remains able to deliver a successful outcome under these conditions during 2009. Industry Commitment: We would ask the UK water industry now to acknowledge the significant investment the selected vendor group has made to this project and as one would expect the vendors are keen to see practical signs of a commitment to implementing the WITS-DNP3 standard in terms of purchases. One thing vendors want to understand is the level of industry commitment to WITS-DNP3. In order to improve confidence in this area we would ask WMOs to think about how to use the WITS-DNP3 protocol in future and ensure this is reflected in their various specifications and frameworks going forward. This will help communicate the right message to vendors and support a successful completion to the project. We recognise that some WMOs may be experiencing a little difficulty in this area as the project has yet to finish and all of the Application Notes are not yet complete. However we are able to provide Application Notes 1 & 2 with other supporting material which would be sufficient to enable appropriate scope, costs and programme to be included in a tender return. If anyone would like help or advice on this matter please contact the WITS Chairman in the first instance using the Contacts page of the website. Maintenance of the standard: The project team has the responsibility to ensure that the long term maintenance of the standard is secure in order to prevent it from becoming fragmented. Therefore a new Protocol Standards Association (PSA) with its own independent elected committee will be set up and take ownership of the standard. The PSA committee and membership will have its own dedicated website. For a small annual fee the members of the user group will have rights to nominate and elect members of the committee, gain access to the Application Notes, information on standards, specifications etc. Vendor members will be able to submit their products for type approval and inclusion on the website database. The membership fee will fund a part time secretary/treasurer whose duties will include administering the new website, maintaining documentation and association funds. Project completion: Whilst interoperability testing has proceeded well, a critical factor affecting progress has been the process of adoption of acceptable security standards. The DNP3 committee has now signed off the proposed WITS security standard and Triangle MicroWorks have subsequently issued their security stack and test harness. The vendors are now incorporating this standard into their products for submission for test verification. Conformance testing will continue for the present with the vendors implementing security during Spring 2010. After that, conformance certificates can begin to be issued to the vendors. It is forecast that the current formal compliance testing will be completed by the middle of 2010. Estimated programme: Development vendors' products: •· Interoperability testing current - Mar 2010 •· Implementation of security current - Mar 2010 •· First issue of conformance certificates Oct 2010 Issue of standard to the public domain Third party vendors products certification •· Starting Autumn 2010 Further information can be found in the pages of this website. We hope you find it useful and informative. The WITS Management Team March 2010 | 
