An outsourced cooling water treatment automated control and data acquisition package, has been designed, installed, and commissioned in over 70 sites in North America and offshore. The standard package consists of a controller, sensors, human-machine interface software, data acquisition and management software, communications, and reporting. Significant challenges to applying this standard package in multiple sites arose from variations in cooling system design and
makeup water quality as well as operations, environmental considerations, metrics, and language. A standard approach has met
these challenges and overcome effects of downsizing through significant reduction in non-value-added, manual activities. Overall system reliability has been improved by migration to best practice throughout the organizations involved and immediate proactive response to
out-of-specification conditions. This paper documents the evolution of a standard cooling water automation and data management package
from its inception to current practice. Keywords: Standard automation package; data management; cooling water systems; alliance; migration to best practice; outsourcing; thin client/server.