Revolutionizing SCADA Systems with IoT: A New Era in Industrial and Critical Infrastructure
For over 50 years, an architecture known as SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) has been used to monitor, manage, automate, and control large-scale industrial processes. Today, SCADA has become indispensable across industries like manufacturing, energy, water and waste management, transportation, and more. The global SCADA market is massive and according to Fortune Business Insights the global SCADA market is expected to grow from $39.32 billion in 2023 to $65.86 billion by 2030.
However, recent innovations in secure and scalable IoT (Internet of Things) technology are revolutionizing how critical infrastructure and other industrial sectors manage those systems. Legacy SCADA implementations, which are notoriously expensive to maintain and upgrade, can now utilize modern IoT components to extend capabilities and lower costs while helping make these systems more secure and robust.
The rapid pace of technological advancement, coupled by a limited set of dominant players has laid the groundwork for massive market disruption. We believe we’re seeing the beginning of this revolution unfold in real-time.
The Impact of the IoT Revolution on SCADA
Legacy SCADA systems, while foundational in industrial process control, are limited by their monolithic, centralized architecture and reliance on outdated technology. Many of them were also developed prior to, or were never intended to be connected to, the internet. However, over time many of these to be connected to larger infrastructure backbones where remote management for resilience and adaptability isn’t just a nice to have but has become an operational requirement. This has forced these systems to connect to the internet in some capacity, leaving them vulnerable to exploitation due to numerous security issues.
However, modern IoT has been built with internet security from the ground up and offers many other advantages like; flexibility, lower implementation and maintenance costs, and enhanced measurement capabilities. Additionally, because of their low power requirements and ability to be deployed and managed in remote locations, IoT devices can also operate in places where traditional SCADA cannot reach.
Decentralized IoT architectures also represent a significant move forward in data capture and analysis compared to traditional SCADA systems. While SCADA typically takes snapshots of a system’s current state, IoT architectures can capture time-series data and archive it in the cloud. This builds comprehensive historical data sets which are instrumental in training AI/ML models to recognize both standard operating conditions and potential failure modes. Advanced analytics enables proactive failure prediction to facilitate predictive maintenance, helping resolve issues before they lead to system failures. The value of this historical data, which is absent in traditional SCADA systems, cannot be overstated. It provides deep insights and fosters a more anticipatory approach to system management and maintenance.
While IoT offers many benefits, the fact that it is simply cheaper in many regards is perhaps its most attractive feature. For example, many of the off-the-shelf components in a SCADA system can cost upwards of $10,000. In a lot of cases they can be replaced with an off the shelf IoT component that costs $200.
Because of IoT’s advantages, it is growing rapidaly within the SCADA community, leading to an increasing integration of IoT technologies within existing SCADA frameworks. This fusion not only facilitates a smoother transition and modernization of legacy systems but also opens the door to a wealth of untapped potential that modern IoT offers.
Integrating IoT with SCADA is necessary for industries aiming to remain competitive and secure in a rapidly evolving technological landscape. The potential of IoT in revolutionizing SCADA systems is vast, and its impact will be felt across various sectors, paving the way for smarter, more efficient, and resilient industrial operations.
Going deeper on SCADA and IoT
If you want to dive deeper into the role of IoT in SCADA, download our full white paper which dives into the potential, aiming to both inform and champion the benefits of modern IoT by covering the following:
- The Role of IoT – We define the role of IoT across the industrial sector and clarify specific use cases where IoT can be used alongside legacy SCADA to upgrade and enhance functionality making it more efficient.
- Mitigating the Risks of SCADA – Modern IoT solutions can help mitigate the inherent risks associated with aging SCADA infrastructure, we will explore the challenges and offer specific solutions and how to effectively plan migration.
- The Future of Industrial Operations – What does a future where a modern IoT infrastructure is the backbone of industrial operations look like? We will provide examples of how IoT can unlock new levels of efficiency and innovation.
- Real-World Transformations – With real-world application examples from customers and other industry experts we will paint a vivid picture of IoT’s transformative impact.
