OPERATIONS & MAINTENANCE
An additional module detects thefts during shut-in conditions
improved leak location accuracy and sensitivity without unnecessary false alarms. Deployment of portable and fixed
hardware with software solutions allows offline data analysis by an experienced engineer. Trough this service, an engineer’s ability to interpret data helps theft to be located down to a few metres, using pressure data collected at 60Hz sample rate and sent to a central location via a cloud-based service. Te data is then filtered to present
only the relevant information required and the locations of the illicit tapping points
are reported to the pipeline operators. It is well documented that online leak and theft detection systems must find a balance between sensitivity and false alarms. Some leak detection systems can detect leaks as small as 0.5% of nominal flow-rate without the issue of false alarms. However, this becomes an issue as most theft events are less than 0.3% of the nominal flow-rate. Te capability to analyse the data offline has allowed the location and detection of theft to within 5m for thefts as small as 0.1% of the nominal flow-rate in static and running conditions.
EXAMPLES OF THEFTS DETECTED T
he technologies discussed in this paper have been applied to theft detection on pipelines
all over the world. The use of a dedicated theft service and leak detection systems has led to the detection and location of many illicit tapping points, such as an oil withdrawal through a 12mm hole that was attached to a 1.5km long underground hosepipe in Europe. The theft detection systems have even detected the theft of
samples (taken before a full product withdrawal begins) between 10 and 20 litres of product from some pipelines during static conditions. In the space of four months
in 2019, two theft events were detected in the UK by both statistical volume balance and negative pressure wave systems. Both theft events had a leak location error of less than 50m. The thefts were found on a multi- product pipeline with varying
Combining a detected theft service with a single or multiple online leak detection system allows for a more reliable leak detection system with the ability to effectively deal with all types of theft events. In the past two years, this combination of negative pressure wave, statistical volume balance and offline analysis has enabled one supplier to successfully detect and locate over 300 tapping points for its clients.
Harry Smith is with Atmos International.
www.atmosi.com
diameters of 6 to 14in with a total network length of 650km. The thieves stole quite small quantities of product during both events, around a total of 4m3
was
removed before the tapping point was located. These events were detected in minutes of the tapping point being opened by the online leak detection systems but did take several days to locate due to the thieves hiding their activity very well. l
www.engineerlive.com 25
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60
