Performance Analysis of Ethernet Powerlink Networks for Distributed Control and Automation Systems

Industrial communication networks are a key element for developing advanced distributed control and automation systems. On the one hand, high performance and low costs are generally required to cope with more and more demanding application requirements, while, on the other hand, real-time capabilities are often needed in an increasing number of automation scenarios. Communication solutions based on Ethernet technologies are becoming popular in many industrial and factory environments and a number of soft/hard real-time competing products have been proposed in the last few years. This paper focuses on the Ethernet Powerlink standard, in general, and on some of its real-time characteristics, in particular. In fact, we present some basic results concerning both cyclic and acyclic real-time traffic in Ethernet Powerlink networks, obtained by extensive simulation, which can be used as a basic step for a better understanding of the real-time behavior of this protocol.