A few weeks back, there was a conversation going in the automation-related blogs comparing HART and Foundation fieldbus. I joined the conversation in this post which included a whitepaper written by Emerson’s Tom Wallace.
The post caused a few comments and a several email exchanges internally within Emerson among the digital communications protocol research and development teams, and with some of the respective foundations.
Tom has synthesized this feedback and updated the whitepaper. The changes are primarily in the order of the compared Foundation fieldbus and HART capabilities as well as the overall tone of the piece.
For process manufacturers making decisions about the automation technologies they will use to run their plants, I hope that this whitepaper along with other sources help to clarify some of aspects and differences of these important digital communications protocols.
Both Tom and I welcome your comments to further the conversation.
