The Future is Now -Part 2.

The Operations of Tomorrow

“Roads? Where we’re going, we don’t need roads.” — Dr Emmett Brown

The world is changing all around you, do you think you are changing with it? In part 1 of this blog post I talked about how information is getting smarter and ways that you can prepare for that, hopefully your takeaway was that a) the future is not so very far away and b) any preparation you are doing now will benefit you immediately, not just in the future.

For part 2, I’ve made a huge leap and assumed that you’ve successfully implemented all the recommendations and your information now interconnects on any device, between all the teams in your organisation and is all seamless and invisible, well done by the way, colour me impressed. Next stop is the Hoverboards, OK, maybe not but what is the next stop I hear you ask?

Part of my role at Phusion is Research and Development, which means that I get to spend at least some of my time looking at cool stuff and things we can use in the future in our solutions. With that in mind I’m going to tell a little story using some technologies that exist today and how if you’ve got your strategy and content nailed you could be using them in the future or even now, you might even get a sneak peek at some things we have coming soon ourselves . The scenario is for the oil industry but please don’t stop reading if you are in the utilities, transport or chemical industries because the principals all apply equally to you.

Meet Dave everyone, Dave is a technician and it’s his first week on an FPSO, his main role is performing hazardous area inspections.

Before he’d even got offshore he’d already logged a large number of hours training on a VR system so he already felt he knew his way around the facility pretty well. The whole vessel had been mapped out using high resolution 360 degree panoramas a few years ago to give a streetview like ability to navigate all over it. He could even have another look around in the comfort of his cabin using his mobile phone and cardboard headset if he needed.

As he came on shift his handheld loaded up with his work orders for the day and his first job was to inspect a temperature transmitter on the gas compressor skid.

Walking towards to his first job he was able to check where he was on his tablet because the facility was covered inBluetooth beacons, which constantly updated his location on a map but also in the control room. The work area was surrounded by a geo-fence at its boundary which pushed an alert to his device to let him know he was about to enter a hazardous area, the tablet was also checking itself to ensure it was rated to enter the area.

The first transmitter he was inspecting was easy to identify, it had a smart tag nameplate, based on supermarket technologythe tag could be updated wirelessly with information but in this case the nameplate also had an expiry set to it so that as its inspection date approached it changed what it displayed to show the inspection was due.

The inspection was undertaken using a simple app on his device, which guided him through the steps for the equipment type. Had he needed to he could have pulled up the manuals, drawings, wiring diagrams or even a video on his smart helmet as all those objects were linked in the digital asset.

As he proceeded he realised that the transmitter cover was damaged and that the seal would need replacing. Because the components list was linked to the stock system he could immediately see that this was an item that they did not carry a spare for but it was an item they could fabricate themselves offshore. He pushed the order button and the 3D printer fired up in the workshop automatically printing a new seal from TPU.

To sign off his inspection he scanned the QR code on the nameplate to signify that the inspection was complete, this then set off several other events. The code was unique to the work order so there was traceability that he had been to physically do the inspection, the failure of the inspection was updated in numerous systems and all recorded that the transmitter was in an unsafe condition and that a spare was being made.

Dave moved onto the next job as the 3D printer whirred in a faraway room…