Why new technologies and digital solutions are opening new opportunities for the downstream industry
The business of the oil and gas industry has changed. That’s clear in the upstream and in the downstream. There are several major trends that will affect how things unfold in the next few years, much of which were widely reflected on at the Baker Hughes, a GE Company Annual Meeting in Florence, Italy. This includes focusing on the need to maximize productivity while also collaborating with each to find the best solutions. And these things continue to be a persistent theme here in Houston at IHS's CERAWeek.
Things like the new IMO regulations on bunker fuel, the exponential growth of electric vehicles adoption, and the growing integration of petrochemical into refinery - all have been at the core of our discussions in Houston. That’s where I joined a few dozen of my colleagues this past week to discuss how these issues, as well as technology advancements and digital enablement, are reshaping the downstream industry.
In this context, I wanted to share a few thoughts of how – with BHGE’s leadership through its technology advancements and digital products - the downstream industry can continue to maximize productivity and deliver the sort of radical efficiencies needed to achieve a good return on investment:
1) Unlock new levels of productivity, reliability and safety
New technology offerings are changing how people work and how we’re able to squeeze out new levels of production and uptime while also increasing safety. There is no doubt that going forward our industry will be more open to technology advances when it comes to Turbomachinery and BHGE has a lot to bring to bear if you think at the following examples:
· Power density: Same Syngas compression service with less units
· Additive manufacturing
· PK3: high pression reciprocating compressor for LDPE application
2) Digital capabilities – value creation through plant optimization
The digital transformation is here. Now it’s about whether or not companies are truly taking advantage of the benefits or letting competitors take the lead. Downstream process automation is not new. However, with our technology we are taking it to new levels by marrying the process physics with turbomachinery monitoring and modeling, as demonstrated by the deployment of BHGE APM systems at refineries in Europe and the introduction of more powerful CPM (Continuous Process Management) solutions thanks to our collaboration with KBC.
3) Improving execution and taking the risk out of projects
Getting things right the first time and taking the risk out of projects is just as much about delivering radical efficiencies as making technology faster and stronger. With our “digital twin” model of syngas trains we are able to cut commissioning times from weeks to days as we predict how the compression train behaves when coupled with the process and can remotely adjust operating parameters.
With our laser scanning techniques, we can capture the physical layout of complex plants infrastructure and use it to design whole units revamping avoiding clashes and streamlining site activities. And with our Smart Helmet we basically connect our field engineers with our 3D models, machinery databases and pools of experts in real time, thereby multiplying their capabilities and effectiveness.
With this in mind, I feel every day more excited about our future in the Refinery and Petrochemical space and how much value we can add as BHGE.
What do you think?