IDENTEC SOLUTIONS

Another Offshore Industry Wakeup Call!

Imagine going to sleep in your room in a 700 bed hotel, setting your alarm for 7:30 a.m. and drifting off to a good night’s rest.  The next morning, you are not woken by your alarm clock,  but a much louder evacuation alarm telling you to evacuate your hotel because it is sinking into 125 feet of water 50 miles offshore!  This is not a dream, it happened just this month in the Gulf of Mexico.  The 700 bed Jupiter Flotel (Offshore Oil Jargon for a floating hotel) operated by Mexico’s state owned oil company PEMEX, began taking on water after a reported valve problem. The evacuation alarm was sounded at 7:38 a.m.  Jupiter is a lot like your land based hotel,  rooms, showers, cafeteria and even maid service, only it’s in middle of the ocean, and there’s no place to park your car! You can only check-in if you arrive by helicopter or boat. Jupiter floats and stays stable because the legs are partially filled (they are called semi-submersible) with water and anchored to the seabed. One of Jupiter’s legs (they are called pontoons) reportedly filled with too much water due to the faulty valve. Just like a boat filling with water, it began to sink.  By this morning,  efforts to stop the leak had failed and the Jupiter flipped to one side and partially sank (check out the picture – it is amazing no one was hurt).  Thankfully for the 713 workers onboard who use Jupiter as their temporary residence during their two week offshore shift,  it sank slowly over 24 hours, giving PEMEX plenty of time to evacuate the workers to the adjacent platform and account for all of them. Their personnel belongings may be wet,  but they are alive! 


Had Jupiter sank quickly imagine the ensuing chaos as management and rescue workers tried to account for 700 guests in a matter of minutes. Some workers would have ran across the bridge connecting the flotel to an adjacent platform, others would have mustered at their designated lifeboats.  As in other offshore accidents, some might have even jumped overboard and swam to safety.  First responders, arriving by boat and helicopter from 50 miles away, would be tasked with figuring out how many people evacuated and how many might still be on board. Difficult enough to account for 700 people in the daytime, imagine if this happened at night!  Now the industry is very safety conscious and offshore workers train for emergencies like this constantly. There is a process they follow when evacuating.  Unfortunately the manual personnel accounting processes used in a lot of these offshore operations is not adequate in major catastrophes, as proven many times. Thankfully that wasn’t the case on Jupiter, it was daylight and time was on their side.


It’s time to change the manual process of accounting for offshore personnel.  Revolutionary technology now exists that cost effectively automates offshore POB (persons on board) and mustering for evacuation counting in an emergency.  These systems, like our WATCHEROffshore solution, should be installed on every offshore platform around the world.  This is not science fantasy, thousands of offshore workers at major operators around the world are already safer using this technology.  How does it work? It starts By registering all workers before they depart onshore and providing them with a small reusable beacon tag that they comfortably wear on their wrist (or as a name badge). This tag is certified for use offshore and is worn until your return onshore! The tag transmits a long range signal unique to each worker, every few seconds, to our WATCHER system installed on the platform.  Their unique data is fed into a database on the platform and simultaneously to other platform databases and an onshore emergency response center. Since no one knows when an accident will happen,  WATCHER is constantly and automatically updating how many workers are on the platform and where they are at all times. If you arrive from another platform,  the system knows you are there without a manual check-in process. That’s important, because no one knows to look for you if they don’t know you are there. During an accident WATCHER monitors the movement and evacuation of everyone on the platform in real time.  Monitors onboard and onshore along with handheld computers at the mustering stations report a continuous count by location of how many workers remain in the evacuation area and what workers by name evacuated already.  WATCHER even knows where they left the platform.  Wondering about privacy, don’t! We built in controls so the system is not misused by management in non-emergency situations. It’s only for safety.  What’s the value?  WATCHEROffshore gives first responders more time to focus on the people who still need help, while assuring management and family who is safe, and keeping themselves out of harm’s way!  Now that’s a wakeup call everyone can use!

By Greg Clawson
Sr. Vice President,  Energy Market Sales, America

The Real Costs of not Automating Offshore Workforce Personnel on Board (POB) and Mustering

There is an accident somewhere around the world on an offshore drilling platform almost every day.  Many are not newsworthy,  lacking serious injury, loss of life, or an environmental impact. Occasionally they are catastrophic, like the BP Deepwater Horizon accident in the US Gulf of Mexico that happened on April 20th, 2010.  This accident,  which resulted in 11 tragic deaths and 17 severe injuries brought the subject of offshore drilling safety to the front pages of newspapers around the world.  In the ensuing studies of the accident,  there was a common emerging theme:  We can do more to prevent accidents and respond better to protect the workers and environment when they happen.  From the official US Government report on the Deepwater Accident, they reported: “Since 2001, the Gulf of Mexico workforce—35,000 people, working on 90 big drilling rigs and 3,500 production platforms—had suffered 1,550 injuries, 60 deaths, and 948 fires and explosions.”  Just this week,  the Wall Street Journal reported that the average payout to the families of the 11 workers who lost their life in the Deepwater Horizon accident was $9 Million dollars.  Payments for injured workers will be less,  but still substantial.  While the value of a human life is priceless,  the real cost to the Oil Industry in the payouts to the workers in all of these accidents can be estimated at well over $1 Billion dollars. Add in their legal fees,  lost productivity, etc. costs are easily in the Billions.  If that’s not bad enough, Just this week emerged the real threat from the US Attorney General to seek manslaughter charges against executives in charge during the BP Deepwater accident. Something has to be done.
 
There are many recommendations to increase safety in offshore drilling operations in the final reports on the Deepwater Horizon accident.  Many deal with inspections, information sharing,  process changes and better response to the incident.  On improving incident response, an automated workforce POB and Mustering system like our WATCHEROFFSHORE Solution,  is already proven to improve response dramatically, increasing the chance to save lives and treat injured workers faster.  For a fraction of the $1 Billion in real costs,  every offshore rig, drilling platform, and ocean going drill vessel in the US Gulf could have an automated system that reports the accurate POB count,  location and status of each worker,  including if they made it (mustered) to the life boats during a catastrophic accident like Deepwater.  This data can be shared real time to both the offshore platform and the onshore incident command post, and finally to Coast Guard and other first responders during the incident rescue process.
 
Why is Automated POB and Mustering systems important?  Consider this from the final report on Deepwater “Rig leaders tried to take a “muster,” a headcount. It would tell them: How many were present? How many were not? People screamed. “Put it in the water! Let’s go!’” Amid the chaos, men were ordered off one lifeboat so a more accurate headcount could be taken. “Man, we ain’t got time for this!” a voice shouted. Another explosion went off.  From one survivors account: After a while, he found a spot to sit alone. “I couldn’t watch it knowing that we had left those 11 guys on that rig.”  With an Automated System like WATCHEROFFSHORE,  the valuable time used for manual headcounts and lack of knowledge on who was still on the rig could have been used to perhaps rescue one or more of the workers left behind, or help an injured worker out of further harm’s way.  We will never know if it might have saved a life or prevented an injury,  because this modern, state of the art drill rig did not have the system.
 
We know automated systems for POB and Mustering work.  Consider the major offshore oil production operations in the North Sea.  After a series of major accidents,  the Governments in the region banded together to enforce a safety culture over the last 10 years.  Today,  1000’s of workers who travel offshore in the North Sea wear one of our WATCHEROFFSHORE active beacon tags. Using this system,  the operators know exactly how many people are on each platform,  what section of the platform they are in,  and in case of an accident,  how many of them made it to the lifeboats.  The system even helps to enforce the safety culture during mandatory training sessions,  automatically collecting data on speed and accuracy of evacuation drills. Does it work? From the same report on the US Gulf Deepwater accident: “From 2004 to 2009, fatalities in the offshore oil and gas industry were more than four times higher per person hours worked in U.S. waters than in European waters, even though many of the same companies work in both venues.” The results speak for themselves! Automated POB and Mustering is part of a safety focused culture that should be adopted around the world.  The life it saves is priceless to the family and a fraction of the real costs to the oil companies who will have another accident with or without the added value of knowing where their workers are and if they got off safely.

By Greg Clawson
Sr. Vice President,  Energy Market Sales, Americas

RTLS Series - All RTLS systems are not created equal II.

In the last post, we looked at the different types of available RTLS systems. This week we will take a look at one that uses RSSI for location calculation.

In an RSSI system, the distance between a tag (attached to an object or person) and a reader is determined by converting the value of the signal strength at the reader into a distance measurement based on the known signal output power at the tag and on a particular path-loss model.

The advantage of RSSI RTLS system is that this is usually a lower cost solution which can utilize existing WiFi infrastructure; however it is not as accurate as other techniques.  The main problem is that the RSSI changes exponentially when the distance increases. Therefore any deployment requires a dense infrastructure of RF sensors if high accuracy is desired, which often increases cost and deployment complexity. This technique requires a precise channel behavior model and is sensitive to channel inconsistency.

IDENTEC SOLUTIONS’ RTLS system uses a different technique, much faster and more precise. IDENTEC’s RTLS utilizes the double sided two-way ranging, which measures time of flight between a tag and a node, rather than the signal strength. The values are gathered from a range with at least three nodes and are then transmitted to a reader connected to a positioning engine - which calculates the tag position. The advantages of this type of ranging is it increases accuracy (new ranging data which is constantly gathered and processed by the tag improve the accuracy of the tag’s position) and increases location speed.

The whole system can be also supplemented by using RTLS enabled handhelds for on the go location and marker loops for precise location of assets in fixed zones, which creates a comprehensive solution for location of assets in any situation.

by
Eva Zeisel

RTLS Series - All RTLS systems are not created equal. (Part 1)

Real-time Locating Systems (RTLS) have been on the market for over a decade. Although they have many similar components due to utilization of  active RFID technology, and a common goal to provide  asset location identification (whether it is a pallet, vehicle or a person) in a real-time; the way the systems  actually achieve this is often fundamentally different. While many RTLS systems use active RFID, others may utilize WiFi or Ultra Wide Band (UWB) technology, and can be found operating on various frequencies, from 128 kHz all the way to 5.8 GHz.

There are basically three main types of RTLS positioning techniques:
1.    Time of Arrival (TOA)
2.    Received Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI)
3.    Angle of Arrival (AOA)

The Time of Arrival technique includes; Time of Flight, Time of Arrival or One Way Ranging, Time Difference of Arrival (TDOA) and Symmetrical Double Sided-Two Way Ranging (SDS-TWR).

The Time of Arrival RTLS systems measure the amount of time required for a signal to travel from the transmitter (tag) to the receiver (reader).  A main advantage of the TOA system over RSSI system is that it achieves a  higher accuracy of location identification and better performance in non-line of sight environments.

IDENTEC SOLUTIONS recently introduced a new product to their portfolio - an RTLS system, which uses one of the most sophisticated methods based on time of arrival, called double sided two way ranging. The system utilizes components such as  i-Q350 RTLS tags, i-SATs (ranging nodes) and RTLS readers i-Port M350 RTLS.

So, how does this system work?
When the tag enters into the i-SAT and reader field, it initiates ranging with all the available i-SATs and broadcasts consolidating ranging information to the reader. The reader is connected to the position engine which further processes the collected data and produces the tag location.

The advantages of this system far exceed beyond the 1 meter accuracy location identification.  Because only the readers require a host connection, the system is exceptionally easy to deploy and requires very minimal infrastructure support. In fact, the system can stand totally independent of main electric lines, as the i-SATs and readers can be also powered by a solar installation kit.  And, the system does not require synchronization which is common with other positioning techniques which also reduce the complexity of installations.

IDENTEC SOLUTIONS‘ RTLS system demonstrates  an ideal combination of high accuracy, high speed and low cost infrastructure, which is of considerable value in today’s market.

By
Eva Zeisel

Interoperability for active RFID: at last, different vendors work together like passive RFID!

Active RFID is the style of RFID that has been around the longest.  It has remained, until the 18000-7 standard, a world of conflicting proprietary approaches ranging from frequency choice to low level protocol nuts and bolts.   There was no inherent advantage for any one vendor to share its technology or to push for a common approach – the market was still very much about differentiation due to the hardware technology itself.  ISO 18000-7:2008, adopted and initiated by the US DoD, based on their practical experiences with a proprietary approach, has led to this break through. 

This breakthrough is similar to what the passive world experienced when EPC Global came into being, Wal-Mart and the DoD adopted it, and then all the hardware providers started to play nice with each other.

The military had many reasons for doing this, but the bottom-line for the commercial side is to open up the prospect that infrastructures and in-transit visibility systems could be built and be cost effective.  What has been needed for active RFID to mimic the interoperability success of the passive world was a set of standards from a recognized standards body and a clout heavy adopter.  The US Department of Defense and its NATO partners (about 40 nations in total) are that clout heavy adopter and the ISO standards group is that globally recognized standards body.

The problem DoD, NATO and the other allies have used active RFID to solve is nothing new to commercial entities.  Simply put, how do I track my stuff from shipment to destination when there is no common infrastructure, technology, or agreement to allow such tracking to be both timely and cost effective?  Shipping companies have resisted adoption of any one particular technology without a significant adoption base.  The new ISO standard and its adoption by DoD has created the opportunity for shippers, ocean carriers, port operators, truckers and airlines to follow their lead and begin to build that flexible infrastructure to answer the question: “Where’s my stuff?”

References:
You can learn more about:
The ISO 18000-7 standard by visiting the Dash-7 Alliance web site (http://www.dash7.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1&Itemid=2).

In addition to this blog posting, we have included on the IDENTEC SOLUTIONS site a white paper titled, Perfected Technology to Manage an Imperfect World – Active RFID Standardization and Interoperability, ISO 18000-7:2008 and RFID III.  Please see this paper for more details on this subject.

http://www.identecsolutions.com/whitepapers.html

by Tom Ryan
VP, Defense and Aerospace

In todays world it is essential that we are effective.

We constantly challenge ourselves on “how can we better optimize?  How can we do this smarter? How do we increase our margin?”

It is all about performance and quality. In the industrial world there are several challenges with safety in the area of oil and gas, mining and tunnelling. 

How will the optimizing process impact the safety?

There should be a way to increase performance without compromising safety.  Otherwise, accidents may occur that include people and events and lead to devastating consequences.
 
With the IDENTEC SOLUTIONS’  WatcherSYSTEM you can safeguard your employees, know their whereabouts in case of emergency, and use the POB system offshore to make the emergency response  quick  and as easy as possible. With this taken care of, we are also able to optimize workflow with active tags on equipment, containers, assets etc.  Keeping track of equipment is also part of our safety philosophy.  By knowing you have the right certified equipment on hand allows for better management of the logistics needed to operate your facility.
 
Imagine a work day where your company has complete visibility off your vital assets throughout your organization - and is able to optimize the usage of these assets.

 It makes good sense to ensure that your production units have what they need to keep production at a maximum. You have a system that not only keeps track of your assets, it also gives you information on all service & maintenance, and has the right certifications so there is no downtime due to break down and unscheduled servicing.

In the event of an emergency situation, having a safety system in place means you are able to respond immediately and co-ordinate operations so your people are located and safe as soon as possible. And, by taking immediate action, you are able to reduce the impact of the accident for both personnel and the environment.

by Frank Wehus
VP Sales, OGM

The Added Value of Deploying Sensor Based Networks

We often talk about the importance of being efficient. How intelligent technology can enhance business processes to save the bottom line. How streamlining workflow can contribute to a significant return on investment. This is all true.

But what we don’t discuss often enough is how technology, when used effectively, can have a significant impact on the environment. For me, I am particularly proud to be a part of this contribution. I know that when our SensorSMART Technology Platform is deployed it will contribute immediately to the management of large, moveable assets. 

Customers’ have reported and unanticipated and immediate 35% waste reduction immediately upon deployment. For instance, this could very easily have been achieved through an Automated Gate Access Solution. IntelliGATE reduces the amount of paperwork and identification needed at yard access points. Instantly truck idle times are reduced by 2, 3, 6 minutes each! Can you image what that can add up to in fuel savings in one year?  And what that alone would mean to the environment? 

Equipment and machines can often be difficult to locate at large scale construction sites. Sometimes ordering duplicates saves from costly downtime. But with asset tracking, needed equipment is located easily. Instantly waste is reduced.

When we embrace intelligent technology, and use it properly, it can have a tremendous impact on a company’s global footprint. Maybe this isn’t something we really talk about, but in my opinion, that’s one serious value added benefit.

by Dawn Antle
Director of Marketing

Issue of Interoperability in Active RFID

Until recently, in the active RFID space, interoperability had not existed. Most players in this space have been keeping their technology proprietary, with variations in frequency allocation and channel utilization, anti-collision, interference avoidance and other factors. Perhaps you are wondering what is the reason for this? There are several. The main reason includes a lack of standardization and a united front pushing for the adoption of one type of technology and the need for interoperability throughout its global supply chain. This is now changing.  In part, this movement can be attributed to the U.S. DoD issuing the RFID III solicitation to expand their pool of suppliers of active RFID technology. The RFID III contract requires all transponders and interrogators from all suppliers to comply with ISO 18000-7 standard and be interoperable. The standard itself is being further supported by Dash 7 Alliance (www.dash7.org) whose ultimate goal is to foster improvements and extensions to the ISO 18000-7 standard and encourage the development and promote usage of compliant products. So interoperability seems to be well underway for active RFID!
 
IDENTEC SOLUTIONS is  proud technology partner with two of the four RFID III contracted suppliers for the US Department of Defense, the world’s largest consumer of active RFID technology.

By Eva Zeisel
Director of Operations