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My ideal production management system

Thursday, January 30, 2014

Nalin Jena, Upstream data manager, with Indian oil company Reliance Industries Ltd, explains what he would like to see in a production data management system

It should have allocation of all disposition quantities (sold at custody transfer, consumed for production operations, re-injected into reservoir, stock inventory, flared and vented, lost).

It should have capability to generate reports and charts via a web interface, and interface with external systems for transfer of data.

It should also handle long-term data capture, a single version of the truth, automation of routine tasks.

The PDMS portal should serve as a single point of entry to access asset information to perform activities such as production reporting, flow assurance and data analysis.

Robust data model

A robust data model should be the fundamental to the design and functionality of the PDMS.

The data model provides object orientation that allows users to easily interact with and understand objects that represent equipment and processes.

The model allows relationships to be defined between the disparate systems and applications, where data is accessed from. The data model is easily extensible, so that new types of objects can be added without writing any code.

The Logical Data model should provide different choices to access data through the data model, such as Web services, Relational database and Programmatic objects.

It should allow organization of multiple operational and business entities that allows data transformation and visualization from various data sources. The data model allows the definition of relationships and inheritance between different equipment's, systems and processes (e.g. platforms, wells, equipment's, etc.).

The data model should be open, extensible and flexible. Other applications can query the data model through web services. The data model can be easily extended to include new types and properties.

It is important to consider carefully if any existing type or property needs to be added or modified, for example adding new wells in the future.

Data capture and communication

Most field measurements are gathered directly from the metered field entities either from DCS or SCADA.

This information should be made available to PDMS via an OPC-DA and HDA compliant historian like PI or IP21.

The major challenge is the communication between subsea control system (SCS) to DCS and then DCS to Data Historian. Often there is a data loss due to bad communication infrastructure.

The preferable communication is through fiber optic cables and is backed by microwave communication system.

The hardware specification for the Data Historian Server should be good enough to store high frequency real time data.

Data validation

The Production Data Management system should be capable of performing data validation after it has fetched the real time data from DCS/SCADA.

A first order filter should be applied to smooth noisy data (as required) for measurement tags. Filtering may be applied for pressure, temperature measurements, but is not necessary for rates, choke positions.

All tags should be scaled (if necessary) to produce measurements in consistent set of units (e.g. SI) and range.

Configurable high and low limits will be used to check if the tag value is between the specified limits. If the tag value exceeds the range, appropriate actions are performed before using them in the calculations. Actions taken can include: 'use last good value,' 'clamp to limits' or 'use raw value.'

The validated data is then used for well wise allocations, daily or monthly as per the business requirement.

The allocation principle is based on theoretical well volume calculation using either Well Test Rate or Well metered volume.

Information presentation

The PDMS should present information and data to users in four different ways. A web based daily production dashboard; web based presentation via portal; standard production and operational reports; and custom reports.

The web based daily production dashboard should include the following key data points:

Daily gas/oil production to be presented as gauges/dials against the corresponding daily gas production targets.

Daily gas/oil sales to be presented as gauges/dials against the corresponding daily gas/oil sales targets.

Gas production chart for a year for the entire field plotted against the corresponding production targets.

Oil production chart for a year for the entire field plotted against the corresponding production target.

The system should be capable of generating standard production and operational reports like field production, well production, well status and well test reports.

The data interfaces should provide data exchange and communication between different systems.

Proper interfaces should be built in PDMS to integrate engineering applications like GAP, Prosper, Eclipse, DSS, Lab information Management System.

Security

There are various levels of security that will be necessary for PDMS, including portal and data model, database and application level security.

The role-based security can be integrated with windows authentication of users/groups. An administrator should maintain a list of Windows users or groups that have access to the Application server. These users can be assigned to one or more roles via a role membership association.

Database connections will be made using security settings defined when the data source connector is created. The default security settings may be adequate without any changes (e.g. integrated security or windows authentication).

Challenges

The following are the major challenges while implementing a production data management system:

Integrating systems and data transfer; identifying optimization opportunities; defining data acquisition standards and guidelines; deciding on the type of data that needs to be stored;

Defining data acquisition frequency; adopting the proper naming convention; defining data retention policies; increased data quality issues/concerns

Developing automated data handling (collection, collation, reporting, transmission, integration); providing alerts when equipment moves outside safe Operating envelope; minimising need for travel/on site work.

Developing a single point of contact (one stop shop, sensor to desktop). Support should be structured, controlled and recorded using tools and documented process. You need to proactively identify and address recurring issues

The prize

The business benefits of a production data management system are identification of well optimization opportunities; automated data transfer liberated operations and engineer's time; reduced deferments; exception based surveillance (quick recognition of problems, focusing of resources on the right tasks).

Also ability to do remote operations (remote start/stop/tuning); reduced down time; improved HSE; better decisions (from more accurate data); faster decisions (from more easily accessible data).



Associated Companies
» Reliance Industries Ltd.

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