The role of drives and condition monitoring in digital twins

30 November 2020

What will the digital twin look like in the automation of the future and what role will drive technologies play? Dominik Follmann, head of the ‘Technical Infrastructure for Digital Twins’ (TeDZ) project at KEB Automation, provides his views.

Today, many companies are talking about the ‘digital twin’, but the definition is still very inconsistent. As a result, digital twins from different manufacturers often do not have the necessary interoperability to use them together.

In its simplest form, a digital twin is a virtual model of a process, product or service. The pairing of the physical and digital worlds enables better analysis of data and improved monitoring of systems. This prevents problems before they occur, minimises downtime, develops new opportunities and even helps to plan for the future using simulation models.

In the TeDZ project, KEB is searching for possible savings potential and how these can be achieved and made available. KEB’s aim is to provide its customers, and their customers, with easy access to the digital twin which will generate significant added value for everyone.

In the pilot project “Digital Energetic Twin” (DeZ), a sub-project of TeDZ, KEB is researching the different facets of digital twins. In particular, the focus is on the energy-related aspects; for example, an ideal energy-efficient design and the optimisation of energy consumption.

Read the full article in the December issue of DPA