Operations Management

The largest oil spill to ever desecrate the ocean motivated the creation of a real-time monitoring platform that aims to keep the seas – and the people who work on them – safer.

Today, on World Ocean Day, we reflect on the tragic happenings of April 20, 2010, when an explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11 workers. The impact was immense, with almost five million barrels of oil flowing into the gulf.

For nearly three months, oil spewed from the offshore well, wreaking environmental havoc on the coastlines of Louisiana, Mississippi, Florida and Alabama; incalculable marine life was killed. It’s estimated that BP was able to capture less than 20% of the oil. The rest either burned, washed ashore as tar balls or remains dispersed in the ocean.

The lessons learned from this horrific incident are being used to help avert similar future disasters. One of those lessons was the importance of monitoring control systems. There is now a mandate that any oil rigs drilling in the Gulf of Mexico must actively monitor the subsea blowout preventer and control system in real-time.

New regulations require drilling companies to track, trend and report on equipment failures, abnormalities and overall system health. Embodying that mandate is the Janus24™ real-time monitoring platform developed by Deepwater Subsea LLC.

The OSIsoft™ PI System™ combined with Hexagon solutions is helping oil and gas companies and drilling contractors to operate safely and in compliance with federal regulations.

Though he wasn’t on the platform when the Deepwater Horizon exploded, Michael Fry was a supporting subsea superintendent for rig operator Transocean when it happened.

The tragedy – and the realization that it could have been prevented – inspired him to found Deepwater Subsea LLC, which focuses on real-time monitoring, competency development and training to end preventable errors through digital transformation and operational excellence.

The combination of human operations procedures (j5 Operations Management Solutions), engineering information and schematics (HxGN SDx^® Operations) with real-time and historical data (the OSIsoft PI System) has enabled the industry’s first digital real-time monitoring platform which utilizes the powerful joint value of these solutions.

This ground-breaking achievement developed in a relatively short-time, especially in the typically slow-moving oil and gas industry.

“To me it’s completely game-changing to have all this information readily available on one screen,” Fry said. “This is the first time end users can go to one place and get all the operations, maintenance, engineering and process data they need to do their duties.

“By having all this information readily available in a digital twin, I believe this is an industry first for the oil and gas industry, where it has been difficult to monitor remote assets and equipment in dangerous areas.”

To learn more about how Hexagon and OSIsoft solutions are enabling greater transparency and heightening Deepwater Subsea LLC’s creditability in the oil and gas industry, read the full case study here.

Watch the video, Digitally Enabling the Oil & Gas Industry to Comply and Operate Safely.

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World Ocean Day is an international day that takes place on June 8. The concept was originally proposed in 1992 by Canada’s International Centre for Ocean Development and the Ocean Institute of Canada at the Earth Summit – UN Conference on Environment and Development in Brazil. World Oceans Day was officially recognized by the United Nations in 2008. The international day supports the implementation of worldwide Sustainable Development Goals and fosters public interest in the protection of the ocean and the sustainable management of its resources.
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