RFID Switchboard: RFID in Post-Katrina Oil & Gas Disaster Planning
By: Jim Caudill, May 27, 2010
RFID in Post-Katrina Oil and Gas Disaster Planning
by Jim Caudill, Xterprise
Preparing for the worst is not a task most people like to think about. When Hurricane Katrina slammed ashore in August of 2005, it left more than $81 billion of damage in its wake. Companies had to become more proactive than ever when it comes to disaster planning—on land, at least. International oil and gas giant ExxonMobil is one such example. Planners learned difficult but valuable lessons from Hurricane Katrina.
After Katrina, unlike now, the problem was too little petroleum supply. The fact that there was no power to pump gasoline at retail stations held up the region’s recovery, as fuel proved to be a key commodity in the clean-up efforts.
While gas production recovered fairly quickly, the lack of electricity at retail stations meant that cleanup equipment could not be fueled, which delayed the removal of trees and debris, the clearing of roads and the restoration of power grids.
In the aftermath of that storm, ExxonMobil redoubled hurricane preparedness efforts at the company’s operating facilities. Those plans include the pre-positioning of emergency electrical generators to deal with power disruptions at critical operations, including pipelines, terminals, refineries and certain retail service stations.
The company decided to store 50 mobile generations at safe locations, but close enough to provide power to terminals and pipeline operations after a major storm. Another 90 mobile generators were stored at four storage facilities strategically located throughout the Gulf Coast, and could be rushed to retail service stations that had lost power.
The generators are expensive and easy to move, and so naturally presented a significant security and asset management challenge. The petroleum industry leader wanted a system that would allow them to “see” those vital assets remotely, to monitor their location and status on a global basis and in real-time, and to allow authorized users to simply and easily access this inventory of fixed assets in an emergency.
The company initially considered a traditional monitoring approach, in which LoJack technology communicates with readers or antennas on cell phone towers to track in-motion assets. But the LoJack system works primarily with specially equipped police scanners, and it is activated only when an asset has been reported stolen. Also, because cell phone towers were likely to be damaged or destroyed in a powerful hurricane, ExxonMobil needed a more rugged and survivable asset tracking system infrastructure.
ExxonMobil called on our Xterprise team to help develop a satellite-based RFID system. In order to provide reliable asset monitoring and tracking for their pre-positioned electric generators, the solution included a satellite-based global locator system (GLS). By incorporating GLS tags mounted on each mobile generator, the software applications can capture the GLS-created data and present the information in a clear, easy-to-understand way.
In addition, active tags were placed on generators stored in ExxonMobil warehouses so installed readers could note when those assets left those storage facilities. Those readers connect to the ExxonMobil Local Area Network (LAN) or to the Internet, and the data collected is fed into the asset tracking system.
Now, when a generator leaves the company's warehouse network, a satellite uplink attached to the asset establishes a connection to an orbiting satellite. Those uplinks provide spatial location information for each generator while it is in transit and while it is installed and working at a remote site.
Data sent via this satellite link is routed to the RFID-led system, and includes the latitude and longitude coordinates and time readings from each device. That data is then translated into topographical maps showing the location and movement of all emergency generators. That means ExxonMobil has near-instantaneous information on where each and every one of these key assets are at any time of the day or night and in any weather condition.
The unique satellite-based solution allows ExxonMobil to monitor and secure critical emergency generators. In fact, the same solution architecture is now being considered to track rail cars and in-transit equipment and materials. By considering RFID technology to help prepare for the unexpected ExxonMobil is now better prepared to help the local communities it serves in times of need.
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