Open wireless communication standard for process control

The Hart Communication Foundation (HCF) has released the HART 7 specification, enabling more capabilities for communication with intelligent field devices, including Wireless HART.

"With official release of the HART 7 specifications, the Wireless HART standard is now publicly available and manufacturers can begin implementing this new capability into their products and process solutions. I expect that products complying with this new standard will be available from multiple manufacturers in early 2008," says HCF executive director Ron Helson.

Wireless HART technology provides wireless communication in the real world industrial plant environment. It is easy to use and fully backward-compatible with existing instrumentation and host systems.

The communication system builds on established and field-proven international standards including the HART protocol (IEC 61158), EDDL (IEC 61804-3), IEEE 802.15.4 radio and frequency hopping, spread spectrum and mesh networking technologies.