According to Shankar Nadarajah, global drone visual inspection project manager for ExxonMobil, there are two key aspects that companies should consider when introducing drone or unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) technology into their inspection portfolio.
"We wanted to scale a global drone program that could reach all of our locations, globally in all regions, and we had significant challenges in wanting to build consistency," Nadarajah said. "We drove a program to identify strategic drone operators around the world to help us support all of our in-country drone programs. We were able to do that very effectively."
This approach has worked well for ExxonMobil.
"That's how, in one year, we've grown to 35-plus locations where we're doing drone inspections for ExxonMobil," he said.
Speaking during a recent panel discussion, Nadarajah said data management was the second piece of the challenge that had to be overcome.
"We knew it was coming like a tsunami effect early on," he said. "You talk about the size of these videos, the telemetry and being able to decide on what's important at the end of the day to help solve the problem at hand."
ExxonMobil started "up front" by establishing a foundational global data management platform, Nadarajah said.
"This platform would allow us to ingest a significant amount of different visual data coming from drones, robotic crawlers, or anything that produces an image or video and can be tied to an inspection checklist of workflow, regardless of whether I'm sitting in a refinery in Australia, an offshore location in Russia or in the United States," he said. "I can see a consistent view of how we do our inspections, regardless of the asset type, whether it be a flare, tank or a pressure vessel."
The data management platform has been very helpful in driving efficiency and consistency "down to the bottom line where the field workers now collaborate between sites and share their learnings on the specific assets they're inspecting. We find that very compelling over the long term of this program," Nadarajah said.
George Williamson, systems engineering and technical assistance inspection, testing and commissioning team for BP, agreed with Nadarajah that operating a drone program in multiple countries comes with its own set of challenges.
"As with Exxon, we first landed our global supply chain contracts with local providers where necessary, because in some countries basically only the military can fly unless you've got special permission," he said. "We worked those things out and initially developed some central guidance notes and guidance documents."
Williamson said BP is now "about 90 percent of the way through with developing what really is a global practice with very clear requirements, recommendations and permissions."
John McClain, security specialist and chief drone pilot for Shell Deer Park, advised companies developing drone programs to focus on their standard operating procedures and their emergency procedures.
"In this environment, you are going to lean on those heavily," McClain said.
Safer, plus substantial ROI
Regarding drone and UAV technology's impact on ROI, McClain shared his experience with a short case study Shell Deer Park recently completed.
"We initially invested $114,000 in the local program in Deer Park. We engaged a few people and got the basic cost for if a project needed a crane and we had to put people up in a basket," he said.
McClain and his team compared that general cost with all the inspections they had conducted in the previous four years.
"Over the past four years, that $114,000 initial investment has ended up saving Shell Deer Park right around $7.4 million. You can hands-down, 100-percent say it's safer to put a drone in the air and let it do an inspection with the operator on the ground instead of having people in the air.
"It's much safer, and it's also nice considering that dollar amount," McClain concluded.
