Integrated Operations Center improves the cost and efficiency of monitoring offshore oil and gas assets.
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Repsol Sinopec Resources UK is an offshore oil and gas exploration and production company operating on the UK Continental Shelf. To maximize efficiency and production levels the company must constantly monitor and maintain assets located in a hostile offshore environment.
Traditionally, responsibility for monitoring and incident response had been split between onshore control room operators and staff based on the assets. That made effective communication, collaboration and control essential, but challenging.
Electrosonic helped the company take advantage of improved communications and networking technologies to move control and monitoring operations from multiple remote assets into an onshore location by creating an Integrated Operations Center where specialist teams can support offshore operations more efficiently.
Establishing an integrated Operations Center would create a collaborative working environment that eliminates distance by bringing offshore to onshore and onshore to offshore. Operational staff on the rigs now have an extension to support teams onshore and can speak directly to specialists as well as exchanging data easily.
Specialist teams onshore support day-to-day offshore operation such as monitoring production data, fulfilling planning, aiding diagnostics and minimizing production downtime by using tracking and forecasting models to proactively identify and mitigate future potential issues and deploying the correct resources as required.
Electrosonic’s solution features a large video wall that allows real-time data to be presented on a single screen and enables staff to quickly shift focus to any platform that requires support.
The system is designed to be easy to use, improving communications and collaboration with multiple offshore platforms from a single location. The use of 4G technology provides complete, consistent coverage of all platforms in the operational region.
The solution is already resulting in measurable benefits with production efficiency increasing from low 30s to high 40s across different rigs to 95 or 96 percent.
The company had to eliminate barriers between onshore and offshore by creating a single working environment, rather than separate onshore and offshore operations.
The aim was to leave only essential personnel offshore, reduce logistics costs and create a safer working environment. The company also wanted to leverage the huge volumes of operational data from the field to reduce downtime, improve planning, forecasting and incident response and develop proactive maintenance routines to mitigate future risks.
To streamline monitoring and control Electrosonic designed, commissioned, installed and supported an ‘Integrated Operations Center’ with a communication bridge to interconnect different technologies. Remote monitoring and diagnostics reduce local resource requirements and provide operators with real-time data to make better decisions quickly. 4G technology enables constant collaboration and data exchange with offshore assets. Proactive monitoring and break-fix maintenance ensure 24x7 availability.
The solution has made a major contribution to increased production efficiency and lower operational costs. Field teams have constant access to control room staff for incident alerts or status updates. Control room staff can quickly identify or forecast potential issues, speeding up response and minimizing expensive downtime and business impact. Simpler control improves asset performance and life, and assures regulatory compliance.
