Valve Actuators

The Valve Actuators market research study delivers current market analysis plus a five year market and technology forecast. The study is available in multiple editions including worldwide, all regions and most major countries.

Most of the growth recorded in 2019 in the valve actuators market can be attributed to increased demand for electric actuators. Electric actuators for isolation application growth outpaced all other actuators types, making electric actuators the largest actuator market by revenue in 2019.  The electric actuator segment benefitted from growing investment from companies in the water & wastewater and upstream and midstream oil & gas (O&G) industries. Customers in these verticals mostly use heavy-duty electrical actuators for isolation applications.  The many benefits offered by electric actuators with diagnostic capabilities are leading companies to choose electric actuators to replace their existing fluid power actuators in both upstream and midstream oil & gas and thermal power industries.

The industrial valve actuator market is anticipated to witness an immediate decline across all segments in 2020 as a cumulative impact of shutdown cycles, disruption in the global supply chain, economic downturn, and lower spending due to the unmitigated spread of the COVID-19 virus and resulting regulatory actions across several nations.  ARC does not anticipate seeing a return to traditional growth rates in the global valve actuator market until 2022 as it expects the adverse effects of the COVID-19 pandemic to linger through 2021.  

Valve Actuators Strategic Issues

In addition to providing a five-year market forecast, the Valve Actuators Market Research provides detailed quantitative current market data and addresses key strategic issues as follows.

Strategic Issue for Users: Automating More Valve Types

Valve installation, commissioning, and maintenance practices have changed dramatically, thanks to intelligent actuators, digital positioners, digital field networks, and predictive maintenance practices.  While there is still room for improvement, these changes are helping to reduce costs and unplanned downtime for owner-operators that have successfully implemented these newer technologies and corresponding work processes.  ARC feels the time is right for owner-operators to expand valve automation by automating more manually operated valves application.  Automating valve actuation mechanism can provide significant economic benefits, but success depends on a willingness to embrace new technologies and resilience toward changing flow control practices that have been in place for decades.

A key benefit is that a single supplier assumes responsibility to ensure these components are integrated safely and securely and are supported by the appropriate services.  This will become increasingly important in the future as manually operated isolation valves become more tightly integrated into plant control and safety systems.

Strategic Issue for Suppliers: Intelligence in Valve Actuators

Maintenance is the second largest controllable cost in a typical process plant.  The contributions that maintenance makes to the enterprise in keeping physical assets in proper working order to avoid business interruption have much greater impact on profitability and plant safety than previously acknowledged.  As end users continue to invest in asset management systems, they are looking to deploy intelligent field devices that can communicate with these systems.  The value of intelligent field devices is in the diagnostic capabilities, which aid in the maintenance decision-making process. 

End users are looking for features such as continuous and remote asset monitoring, early fault alert, and storage of diagnostic data in their valve actuators.  Intelligent, non-intrusive electric actuators with valve operation data storing and transmission capability are transforming the valve operation management and space.  These intelligent actuators can be retrofitted to both on-off and control valves, and the operating torque profiles data transferred from these actuators can be leveraged for both condition monitoring and proactive maintenance. 

So far, very few leading electric actuators suppliers are offering these intelligent actuators in the market.  More conventional electromechanical actuators suppliers can capitalize on the emerging demand for intelligent actuators.

Strategic Issue for All Market Participants: Economic Decline Due to COVID-19 

The COVID-19 outbreak has caused disruptions to global supply chains and business operations.  While the pandemic did not impact the 2019 demand for valve actuators, the market projections do take into account industry trends with ARC’s best estimates for how the COVID-19 pandemic will impact the valve actuators market in different vertical industries.