Process control systems have changed dramatically over the last 50 years. As a result, the role and workload of the process operator has changed. Most important changes are :

Control devices have moved from panel to computer screens. The quick overview that the operator had, when he walked to his panel is no longer there. Now the operaor has to scroll through multiple images to see factory status. And whether there are controllers in a status that is wrong (Hand/Autom).

Alarms are no longer visualized on an alarm panel. The restriction on the number of alarms is therefore gone. The risk of declaring to much alarms during engineering is very high. If there is no good alarm management, is the risk of a cluttered alarm display very high. In the event of a calamity, hundreds of alarms will display at the same time. The task of the operator to react on the most important alarm is almost impossible.

Operating systems have moved from hardware to software. The traditional PID controller has become many times more complex and many more control blocks have been developed,

More transmitters in the field that have also become smart, and provide more data. All this information comes to the operator and must be processed by him.

Number of operators has been reduced, who often have to perform even more tasks.

Other considerations :

Colour (color) blindness (colour vision deficiency, or CVD) affects approximately 1 in 12 men (8%) and 1 in 200 women.