Australian oil and gas company uses passive and active RFID tags to track construction equipment
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Oil and Gas Australia is testing the W-tag at one of its LNG operations, which was developed in collaboration with Woodside, Omni-ID and Ramp.
Australian oil and gas company Woodside is testing dual-band passive and activeRFIDTag, the RFID tag is different from the general tag, it is a long and short dual-band tag that has passed the safety certification, which is used to track the parts of petrochemical conveying equipment.
The W-tag developed by Woodside, which integrates active 433 MHz RFID transponders and EPC Gen 2 passive UHF RFID tags (918-926 MHz), the former complies with the 18000-7 (Dash7) standard, respectively, by Omni-ID and Australian Ramp provided by the company.
W-label tested at LNG filling station on Australia’s North West Shelf
Woodside is responsible for six of Australia’s seven LNG filling stations. Australia will become the world’s largest LNG exporter in the coming years, and the region’s oil and gas industry faces enormous production challenges. LNG plants are expensive to build due to the harsh environment in Australia. Woodside is Australia’s largest oil and gas resource operator, with over a decade of experience delivering oil and gas resources to Asia.
During the engineering design, construction and operation stages of oil and gas resources, a series of problems may occur, such as disordered transportation of engineering materials and loss during transportation. These issues are costly for both building contractors and their clients.
Using RFID technology can solve part of the problem. For example, RFID technology can quickly locate a piece of equipment, which will replace the previous work method of manual inspection of materials and tools and equipment by workers.
Woodside has tried several existing RFID tags, but found no suitable ones. Either because of the lack of the necessary explosion proof certification (IECEx), or because passive UHF RFID tags have limited read distances. The solution requires that the tags can be used for at least five years, because the construction period of large-scale projects is generally five years, and active tags are required to support longer read and write distances. After the construction is completed, the factory is handed over to the operating agency, and the factory materials are inspected and maintained every day with the help of passive tags. Therefore, this RFID solution requires an active-passive hybrid intelligent tracking system.
In the first quarter of this year, Woodside installed fixed RFID readers or portable handheldReaderRead the labeling component. The scheme allows local or other regions to read and write the W tag, so that the contractor can update the status. The read data is sent to Woodside’s backend server over a Wi-Fi connection. Of course, the Echo project is looking into the use of cloud computing for data transmission and processing.
W tags are installed on valves, trim parts, other equipment and vehicles. Accuracy tests have been successfully performed in both stationary and mobile conditions to determine the accuracy of RTLS.
New labels are installed when the material is manufactured. Users can read active tags over long distances because RFID readers can read active tags up to 400 meters away.
When the device enters life cycle maintenance, use short-range reads to save battery life. At this stage, passive tag information is read.
The W-tag can adapt to harsh environments, such as passing a four-foot drop, vibration, and a 4,000-ton stress test.
After the successful test of RFID technology, Woodside expects to apply RFID technology to accurate and fast material management, asset maintenance, lifting equipment certification, quality inspection, tracking vehicle location, rental equipment monitoring, and equipment security protection to improve factory productivity.
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