Innovative Internal Inspection Using Robotic Inspection without Man Entry

Abstract

Pressure vessels used in the petrochemical industry inspected manually by people working inside the vessels, which is a very time consuming operation in a potentially hazardeous work environment. As per by Van Den Bos, Strand, Mallion et al (2016) "The PETROBOT project formed and funded by EU with the aim to bring together inspection methods and remote delivery to reduce risks and cost involved in inspection of pressure vessels and brought together the complete value chain, from robot and inspection technology providers to inspection service providers and end-users. In the PETROBOT project, robotic solutions developed for the internal inspection of pressure vessels (FAST platform, BIKE platform and Snake arm) and storage tanks (tank robot). Several aspects related to safe deployment and retrieval of the robots through side and top manway in horizontal and vertical vessels were tested. All the robots were able to enter in all types of vessels and demonstrated an acceptable level of operational readiness. The Robotic technology now sufficiently developed as a platform to perform the inspections using established techniques." ADNOC CEO has launched Oil & Gas 4.0 in the year 2019 and stated that Oil and Gas 4.0 means rethinking how our industry adopts and applies technology, connects with non-traditional partners, shows environmental leadership and most importantly attracts and retains talent. We as, ADNOC Gas Processing Technical Services Engineering division inspired by the ADNOC CEO's speech and adopted introduction of innovative technology in every sphere of technical field. We choose to explore the possiblitity of the introduction of drones, robotics and other technology that are increasing efficiency and productivity while protecting the environment in all stages of energy production. ADNOC Gas Processing has conducted Corrosion and Inspection forum in 2019 as a part of digitasation by inviting leaders in the NDT field to show cause the available latest technology. During the forum, we could explore several advanced NDT techniques including Drones, robotics, helmet mounted cameras and wireless UT thikness monitoing devices. With the advancement of technology, drones once predominantly used for patrolling highways and delivery of the foods were used extensively for visual inspection of elevated structures (stacks) and robotics are used to inspection pressure vessels and storage tanks with out necessity of man entry and thus avaiding the human exposure to the hazdous evironments.