Automation systems offer great control and economy, along with massive data opportunities.
By Paul Wiseman
In the I Love Lucy episode entitled “Job Switching,” Lucy and Ethel take jobs on a production line at a candy factory. In what is one of the funniest “golden age” television scenes ever aired, we see the ladies panicking as they fail to keep up with the ever accelerating conveyor belt and, in desperation, eating more candies than they coat with chocolate.
Today’s candy factory conveyor belt is the increasing amount of data being collected and stored in many fields, including the oil patch. The proliferation of automation for managing wells, pipelines, pumps, drilling, and mapping has had the secondary effect of amassing mountains of data—so much so that the term Big Data is now a household word.
It’s one thing to understand that this data offers tremendous opportunities—and something else to imagine exactly what those things are and how to mine them.
Shawn Watson, North American sales manager for Newgate Instruments, said end users are gathering much more data than they can yet make use of.
“We learned a long time ago to collect all this data,” Watson observed. “We just haven’t known what to do with it. Everybody for years was just gathering all this data and storing it in these huge databases and they weren’t really doing a whole lot with it” beyond setting up alarms when that data showed that a system was outside of tolerances. Now there are web-based SCADA systems and other Internet database companies who are beginning to see how they can use this data to reduce operating expenses.
For example, some companies monitor compressors for increased temperatures or falling oil pressures and other indications of impending failure. That way, technicians can repair or replace them before they fail, saving downtime, or making small repairs before they become bigger.
Remote monitoring also allows for faster reactions when trouble starts. Before automation systems and remote monitoring, a compressor or pump or other system could fail and remain out of action for hours or more before discovery. Automation allows office personnel to shut systems down before a major issue occurs, and to send out repair technicians right away. “A day or two of lost production is a big number,” Watson noted.
The way these hardware and software systems connect is known as the Industrial Internet of Things, or IIoT. IIoT is defined as smart machines with pervasive sensing, networked to the Cloud. In the oil industry, Watson said, “Literally billions of data points per month” flow into the Cloud where Cloud-based analytical software packages are breaking down that data. “The results of these analyses allow midstream, upstream, and downstream companies to better optimize their operations,” he said. Production, distribution, billing, and other functions will all gain cost savings as they further mine and examine this data.
The oil industry is demanding more and more of the hardware components of the IIoT, a situation that is not lost on companies like Newgate. The vast expanses of West Texas oil fields require data collection hardware that runs for extended periods of time without oversight or connection to power lines. Newgate has recently developed the JT400 Multivariable Pressure Transmitter to reduce power consumption and to simplify installation in those remote areas, according to Newgate’s product manager, Paul Mayer.
Currently, most installations that monitor movement of natural gas through a pipeline involve a metering device and a separate radio. Because of the potential hazards of having an electronic device near a natural gas pipeline, midstream companies are required to locate the radio at some distance from the meter. Connecting the two devices involves digging a trench to run wires, which is time consuming and costly. The transmitting device runs on a bank of batteries that are charged by solar panels.
A separate computer measures differential pressure, static pressure, and temperature at one-second intervals and averages them in 15 minute increments to ascertain the flow. Those gas flow computers also draw significant power, requiring the installation of a number of large solar panels. These large panels are often a target for oilfield thieves.
Newgate designed a system that would combine all that into one piece of equipment to save time and money without sacrificing accuracy.
“What we decided we would do,” said Mayer, “was to take advantage of the technology of low power. We extracted the front end of a gas flow computer, hardware-wise—those things that can run on low power. That included the pressure sensor and the temperature sensors.” They then put this hardware into their gauge.
The unit can store that data locally or transmit it wirelessly to an RTU to complete the calculations. “The advantage is, you can locate one RTU [on a site] and communicate with a number of or products, and avoid the battery boxes and the trenching and everything else.”
The JT400’s power demands are low enough that a small attached solar panel with a small battery pack supplies all the power needed. In fact, the battery pack can run the unit for up to 100 days without recharging. Of course, there are pretty much never 100 consecutive days in West Texas where the sun doesn’t shine.
Transmitting data every 15 minutes instead of continuously also saves power, Mayer noted.
The pressure transmitter also has a USB port that allows personnel to plug a computer directly into it to calibrate the unit and to set up the intervals for data calculations. “If you lose transmission you have up to 30 days to collect the data locally,” said Mayer.
In addition to containing the solar panel and batteries, the JT400 also contains the radio and the antenna in one package.
With solar panel theft a significant problem at remote sites, Watson stated that the small, nearly invisible solar panel on the JT400 is not likely to be stolen.
This kind of technology makes remote pressure monitoring more available because of its lower cost. The combination of most cost effective technology for both monitoring and control, and software that digs deeper into the collected data, is vital to the survival of the oil industry in both good and bad times. Mayer and Watson sated that the challenging oil markets have driven more customers their way—companies that in better times would have had neither the time nor the impetus to look at new, more cost-effective technology.
It is almost a perfect storm for IIoT companies, making them among the few who are finding success during these times, with the promise of improved efficiencies that will still pay dividends whenever oil and gas prices go back up.