Abstract:
Cyber Physical System (CPS) based Digital Twin (DT) has become one of the most trusted and in-use automation technology in the Power, Energy, Process, and Manufacturing industry. With its primary role in monitoring of systems operations and its performance remotely; the added advantage it has is the controllability from a distant place where normally it takes time for the operations team to reach and address the requirements. The added beneft it provides is measurement and control of scattered process systems, i.e. operations ongoing by different systems in different locations for a single cause, especially in Oil and Gas sector. Here, the process deals with the large number of high-pressure, large-volume and explosive nature of the medium that are the oil and gas producing wells. These are located at considerable distances from each other in an oil and gas feld, where unmanned operations is a norm, and without Automation, the same is not possible. Taking advantage of Digital Twin Technology based on Industrial Internet Of Things (IIoT) derived from Industry 4.0, this paper focuses on providing automation solution to a gas feld having several gas wells connected through hundreds of kilometers of gas transportation pipelines, junctions equipped with valve assemblies and distribution manifolds for gas sales to customers, all currently operating in manual mode with operator(human) intervention or high capital Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system, while alternating it with Digital Twin based automation systems instead. Natural gas felds with hundreds of scattered wellheads require optimized production, reduced downtime, and enhanced safety. Conventional SCADA systems provide remote visibility but are capital intensive and maintenance heavy due to high end RTUs, fber optic communication network, and complex hardware. Digital Twin technology based CPS Industry 4.0 and the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) together building a enable cost-effective, scalable, and safer realtime monitoring and control. Battery-powered sensors and edge devices, cloud analytics, and intelligent algorithms can dynamically allocate gas production, aid in identifying bottle necks in the existing network, reduce human feld presence, support predictive maintenance and aid in ensuring Health Safety and Environment requirements.
