Transmitton Develops £1Million Monitoring System
24 November 2005 15:17
Leading UK supplier of integrated control and asset management solutions, Transmitton, is carrying out a £1million masterstation upgrade of Control and Monitoring Systems (CMS) at Shell's gas terminal in Bacton. After 15 weeks of stringent testing, it is now being installed.
Among the largest projects in the UK gas industry, the system will monitor and control all 27 offshore gas production platforms and onshore gas reception facilities through existing Remote Terminal Units (RTUs). Installation is expected to be complete by the end of December. Originally manned, many of the gas platforms are now monitored remotely from Bacton, providing around 10% of the UK's annual demand for natural gas.
The system interfaces with many third party metering, fire and gas, ESD and compressor control systems. The cromos masterstation enables OPC interconnection to third party systems and three interfaces have already been identified for integration into the new system immediately after site acceptance testing is completed in early 2006. The system also transfers data to Shell's Management Information System (MIS).
This project cements a long-standing relationship with Shell that started in 1992 when Transmitton provided the supervisory CMS for the Shell Revamp Project, which since then has successfully controlled many of their Southern North Sea (SNS) assets. Availability and reliability have been maximised in the resilient new upgrade, providing a highly reliable control solution. Advanced alarm management facilities allow better control of alarms generated by the system, which minimises interruption to the operators.
Transmitton systems consultant, Tim Gregory, said: "This project presented a considerable challenge because of the size and complexity of the system; some 400 mimics having been configured, reviewed and accepted and over 25,000 database points having been configured and tested."
The new system has a cromos masterstation based around dual servers in redundant configuration with internal communications supported by a dual fault tolerant Ethernet network. The RTUs are also fully redundant with communications between the masterstation and offshore RTUs via dual diversely routed microwave radio links.
"We worked closely with Shell's integrated service contractor AJS throughout the project and look forward to a successful implementation and commissioning phase at Bacton," said Tim. "We have provided on-going support, upgrades, additions, extensions and enhancements to the system throughout its long life through our technical support services team and we look forward to continuing to provide the highest levels of support for many years to come."
Transmitton continues to strengthen its position in the UK having won the Enterprise Through Innovation award and Business of the Year in the 2005 Leicestershire Business Awards.
For more information on this company:
Transmitton - Integrated Control and Asset Management Solutions for the Rail Industry
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