Preface
One of the primary goals of Oil and Gas pipeline operators is to ensure continuous and reliable delivery of crude/refined products to customers while ensuring safety of its employees, the public, customers, environment and its assets. They are faced with the increasingly complex process of maintaining the delivery of crude oil/gas/refined products at the minimal cost and impact on the surrounding environment. Pipelines are exposed to various risks such as natural forces, tectonic movements, inundation, storms, erosion, landslides, corrosion, excavation, material of construction, weld or joint failure, equipment failure, incorrect operations and asset mal-performance. In addition, Operators face strenuous regulatory governance and reporting requirements which in turn demand extensive data capture and information flows. Given the environmental focus, the regulatory and reporting requirements will continue to become more meticulous on reporting and pipeline maintenance. Pipeline operators utilize IT and Automation Technologies such as Asset Management, GIS, Portals, SCADA, Leak Detection, Condition Monitoring, Reliability-centered Maintenance etc both for pipeline operation and its safety. In addition they deploy manual methods for maintaining integrity such as inspections, surveys, maintenance schedules, helicopter patrolling, intelligent pigging, DCVG survey, ECDA, SCCDA and other specific processes.
With automation and emergence of Human Machine Interface applications, pipeline operators now can develop graphics-based visualization of Pipeline control and monitoring systems; they can further deploy an IT framework incorporating individual integrity programs, integrating them for getting a holistic view of the risks and threats looming across the pipeline. The solution can have an intelligent information database, analytics in conjunction with field processes and activities. It shall encompass