The digitalization of oil and gas facilities is becoming a new technical arena. Effective solutions can be used to convert data into information and knowledge, which can then be used to improve maintenance operations. This paper discusses several aspects of this process, ranging from a discussion of maintenance strategies to the opportunities presented by extracting new information from big data.

Introduction

Fieldbuses, device diagnostics, and advanced management-and-control systems collect large amounts of data, but acquiring and applying methods of exploiting the data have lagged. End users have expressed doubts that they are realizing value from these solutions and have wondered whether a return to simpler systems is needed. In this paper, the authors conclude that condition-based maintenance can reduce the cost of maintenance operations significantly and that further potential in predictive-maintenance regimes exists as experience with base data is gained.