Method to separate and persist static and dynamic portions of a control application

An industrial control system configured to retain a plurality of data objects in memory at power loss, comprising:

• a processor executing a control program having a plurality of static data objects and a plurality of dynamic data objects, wherein each static data object is changed at a frequency less than a preselected threshold frequency and each dynamic object is changed at a frequency greater than a preselected threshold frequency;
• a non-volatile memory device storing each of the static data objects;
• and
• a volatile memory storing each dynamic data object and at least a portion of the static data objects, wherein the processor executes at least one routine to:
• allocate an address in the volatile memory for each of the static data objects stored in the volatile memory,
• track the change of the portion of the static data objects by storing the changed data object in the non-volatile memory prior to storing the changed data object in the volatile memory,
• store a changed data object from the portion of the static data objects in both the non-volatile and the volatile memory when one of the data objects from the portion of the static data object changes, and
• monitor a low voltage signal and wherein, if the low voltage signal is active, the at least one routine copies a present value of each dynamic data object from the volatile memory to the non-volatile memory.