SolutionsManagement

For an oil and gas organisation allocated production represents the "projected income" for the company.  The earlier and more accurately this can be determined, without a requirement for later re-apportionment (and hence possible unexpected value reduction) the more efficiently the business can be managed.

We believe that implementation of Production or Hydrocarbon Allocation Management systems is greatly simplified when they are closely coupled with the site measurement databases using modern intranet technology.

For a number of years Aquidata Excel has been delivering automated metering "supervisory" systems to the Oil and Gas industry for use at the measurement site.  These systems seamlessly combine both allocation and fiscal data presenting it as a homogeneous information set.

A natural extension of this technology is to utilise the metering supervisory database as primary data source for a company's allocation systems thus saving on interface development and longer term management issues. All these benefits of synergy accrue from using our PALS and GEM products to implement an integrated Aquidata Excel solution.

We have the capability to deliver complete turnkey solutions from design through to delivery and commissioning of the most modern allocation and production data management systems you can imagine.  To date we have successfully implemented complete projects for :-

• Amerada Hess : TAS Triton Allocation System - for Bittern, Guillemot and Clapham fields
• Lundin Britain : LAMS Lundin Allocation Data Management System - for Heather and Broom fields
• PetroCanada : VARIS - Guillemot and Clapham field management .

In addition it is Aquidata Excel's measurement database technology that provides the online source information for the following allocation management systems :-

• BP : CATS Gas Receiving Terminal in Teesside
• Total : Elgin Franklin platform
• ConocoPhillips : J-Block platform
• BP : ETAP Satellites

Given the availability of modern telecommunication connections via both terrestrial and satellite technology it is now possible to connect multiple office sites to remote plant systems.

By working cooperatively with international terrestrial and maritime telecommunication experts in other companies we can guarantee to provide connectivity between sites located virtually anywhere in the world.

Our Remote Monitoring and Validation systems allow us to present data in a timely and accurate fashion to your expertise whether they are independent consultants, your own staff or at those of an equipment supplier. This capability facilitates smarter working by operational staff resulting in improved up-times and better plant management.

Using our standard suite of software Aquidata Excel has implemented systems where data is :-

• either delivered direct to a customer data server
• or provided a "managed service" to maintain the central data server and then interface user networks

These systems can provide both manual and automated validation of the data content to raise alerts if information discrepancies are detected or data feed fails.

Accurate measurement of the low flow rates in a flare system has long been regarded as a very difficult thing to achieve with any degree of confidence.

As an alternative approach, working with specialist process consultants, Aquidata Excel has used the data in a platform historian to calculate an auditable flare estimate. This is calculated using the time that process lines leading to the flare are open and the physical configuration of each line.

For our client this had the benefit that they were able to agree a workable flare consent with the regulatory authority without significant disruption to the planned production profile our expenditure on additional CAPEX.

Loss Reporting (or Performance Model) is a process that captures where losses are occurring and then ranks them in terms of production impact.

Loss Reports allow management to see where they should be focusing their primary efforts to solve problems and improve productivity. This is not necessarily where the most time is lost because there are cost factors associated with types of losses and plant built into the software system to weight the calculations appropriately.

There are two elements to this application :-

• data capture
• reporting

Typically data capture is a manual process with automation of data from a historian wherever possible. Simplicity is the key with forms driven by pre formatted selection lists rather than free text entry thus making the information easy to enter and ensuring accuracy.

Normally entry/update of the input Loss Report data is combined with activities to generate a daily operations report.

Working Closely with our customer we have created an effective Loss Reporting system for ConocoPhillips on their Judy production platform in the UK North Sea.

For one of our timber industry customers we have recently delivered a simple system that interfaces the data output of an Brookhuis Micro-Electronics moisture meter. For every piece of wood passing the sensor the processed moisture content data is logged down to ASCII text file, separate files can be created for each batch.

The site management use this information to calculate statistics for each batch using an offline spreadsheet.

This information is then retained for quality control and audit purposes. As illustrated in the cutout below this system has the potential to report data from the plant station across Radio LAN direct to the office data server thus saving significant data retrieval and processing time.

Using the information being gathered by the plant data historian Aquidata Excel can implement general applications that the customer engineers will use to optimise equipment usage, schedule workovers and plan maintenance etcetera.  All these systems allow your engineers to get away from gathering data, work smarter and focus on the real business issues.

Typical applications include:-

• Recommendations for Gas Lift usage
• Down Hole Pump performance tracking
• Rotating equipment start/stop logs
• Compact Heat Exchanger safety monitoring
• Sub Sea line pressurisation cycles
• Valve Transit time tracking

The potential for business improvement is phenomenal and the opportunities are many and varied.

Application of unmanned installations whether they are in the desert, sub-sea or on the moon is the future for cost effective, safe and environmentally aware project developments.

Aquidata Excel has provided effective management systems that are actively being used in the North Sea today to run the ConocoPhillips Jade wellhead asset and hence believe we can contribute significant knowledge and expertise to similar project developments.