Wireless monitoring instruments have more flexibility in field applications

Any new construction project, no matter the size or size, smart wireless technology can significantly reduce installation costs. If wireless accounts for 45% of the project points, it will save more than 35% of the cost of the project, infrastructure, and car than the cable program. .

In the past two years, innovators in the oil and gas industry have experienced and confirmed the value of wireless monitoring instruments in remote or hard-to-reach areas. If wired equipment is used in these applications, the high construction cost required will be impossible. Suffered. Regardless of the running performance or cost considerations, wireless solutions have great advantages, and they are safe and reliable. They can be widely used in upstream operations that traditionally use wired solutions.

Traditional wiring will still be used for continuous control, such as offshore platforms and refineries, and safety systems. However, wireless technology has been commonly used in existing plant installations and has also been used in new construction projects.

Compared with wired technology, advanced wireless technology has low input costs and less floor space, making it an ideal choice for platform applications. Compared with the traditional 4-20 mA analog cable meter, each wireless node can save 30% of the cost, and wireless technology has become the mainstream application in North America.

Anyone familiar with industrial automation knows that since the mid-1990s, people are looking for a technology that can replace the 4-20mA analog standard. Later, ISA developed the Foundation fieldbus and other technologies, which have been widely used in various industrial industries. .

The latest research shows that if the required cabling does not exceed 250 meters and the number of connection points is less than 500 points, the installation cost of the wireless instrument is lower than the Foundation fieldbus solution. Above this target, fieldbus solutions will save money over wireless solutions. This means that offshore applications can use these technologies in a comprehensive way, using traditional 4-20 mA in safety systems; control using fieldbus; monitoring and low-frequency control applications using wireless technology. The advantages of wireless also include: simplification of engineering and implementation work, faster and more flexible start-up, even if the design changes later also no problem, because it is very simple to install.

Safety is also a factor to be considered. Process and operation information can be transmitted wirelessly as needed. Workers do not need to manually read data in high-pressure and high-temperature areas.

Emerson's smart wireless solution uses self-organizing mesh network technology to make up for the shortcomings of old-fashioned systems that require visual paths. For example, wireless meters can be arbitrarily distributed on land-based oil fields, and the use of traditional wired meters for data collection is difficult to implement and lacks flexibility. The self-organizing mesh network continuously monitors the pressure, temperature, flow and vibration measurement equipment data transmission, and automatically finds the best communication path for the signal to reach the gateway. If an obstacle temporarily blocks the communication path, the nearby wireless meter can be used as The router continues to pass signals. By maintaining signal connectivity in this way, the reliability of data transmission can be over 99%.

This technology is fundamental to the WirelessHART standard, which has been recognized by more than 200 members of the HART Communication Foundation representing instrument manufacturers and users. At present, a considerable number of field instruments, valves and equipment positioning monitors, vibration data transmitters and smart wireless gateways can meet this standard and have been applied in the petroleum industry.

Successful project

The UK's BPWytch field has long since applied intelligent wireless networks, one of the largest offshore operations in Europe. In order to increase the efficiency of the staff and eliminate the need for daily manual inspections to read meter readings at the wellhead, BP installed 40 Rosemount wireless pressure transmitters, two at each wellhead. The Smart Wireless Gateway is installed separately outside the process area and passes the wireless transmitter's signal to the control system. Adding any new wireless meter can be performed in just 30 minutes. The wireless meter can continuously monitor the well and find abnormal pressure conditions.

Chris Geen, manager of BP, said: “The Wytch field is an important pilot project for BP to prove the adequacy of self-organizing wireless networks. With the successful application of this project, BP is also preparing to apply smart wireless solutions to similar offshore platforms. in."

StatoilHydro also uses smart wireless networks on its Grane oil platform to remotely monitor wellheads and heat exchangers located in remote areas of the North Coast. Some obstacles block the visual communication path, but this is not a problem at all for self-organizing wireless networks.

In this case, 22 wireless pressure transmitters were installed at the wellhead to measure the annulus pressure, and another 12 tables monitored the inlet pressure and pressure drop of the heat exchanger. Each transmitter passes data through a wireless gateway to the control room operator station.

In the use of wireless instruments, the signal strength and consistency are excellent, and the reliability and stability of the data are up to 100%, which greatly reduces the workload of manual reading of meter data. It also reduces the chances of workers being exposed to dangerous locations. Geir Leon Vadyim, director of oil platform instrumentation, said: “We are very satisfied with the performance of smart wireless networks. After a brief training, our instrumentation engineers can easily be anywhere Install new wireless devices."

The Venezuelan national oil company invested millions of dollars in transforming the automation equipment at the Morichal plant, which included installing wireless networks and monitoring 180 wells. The wireless ad hoc network uses more than 600 wireless transmitters. The wireless solution not only saves costs, but also provides reliable pressure and temperature measurement data. If a wired solution is used, there will be ground faults, and the electronic drive equipment installed at the wellhead will produce harmonics that affect the accuracy of the wired instrument.

Research on Wireless Solutions in New Projects

Recent studies have shown that the advantages are most significant when smart wireless technology accounts for 25% to 45% of the total project I/O, both in small-scale or large-scale new-build projects. In addition, wireless technology can increase the flexibility of project design, and at the same time, it can shorten the construction period because of its simple implementation and installation. The research results show that the best implementation of the new project is a combination of wired HART, fieldbus and wireless communication.

The wireless solution is used to build a new maritime manual operation platform. According to Emerson's survey of a 4000 I/O offshore platform, wireless technology can be used in a wide range of process applications and is not limited to places where it is not possible to adopt a wired solution or to implement a wired solution at a high cost.

In terms of project installation costs, compared with various combinations of wired HART, fieldbus, and wireless devices, we found that wireless solutions are most cost-effective compared to other communication technologies. In the study of the above-mentioned oil platform, about 17% of the signals were transmitted through wireless devices. Installing a wireless network in the process control system saved 7% (US$1 million) in installation costs, and in addition, reduced 800 Wired connections, thus reducing the weight of 35 tons, and reducing the space occupied by the deck by 129 cubic meters due to the reduction of cables, trunking, junction boxes and cabinets.

Calculating the cost based on the wiring length of the conventional wired solution, we found that regardless of the distance, the wireless meter can save costs, and the longer the distance, the more savings. Based on this, the research team created a cost calculator to measure the cost savings of the project using the wireless solution.

Wireless technology is used to create new process plants. An independent consulting firm conducted a survey of chemical process plants and reached a unanimous conclusion: Regardless of the size of the project, the use of smart wireless technology can significantly reduce the cost of installation. If wireless accounts for 45% of the project points, Then its cost in engineering, infrastructure, and driving costs more than 35% over the cable program.