The oil and gas terminal is a part of the terminal system that is considered to be a major part of the delivery system of oil and gas from where these products are processed to the points where they are consumed. The transportation of these products requires very high levels of safety and control. This safety and control is provided by the terminal automation system. Typically most of the historical activities that were performed in the delivery of these products were performed by manual tasks. These manual tasks could be rife with risks and safety problems. The main roles that are performed by the terminal automation system in replacing manual tasks is to increase accuracy and efficiency of product deliveries and to positively mange safety and risks that are involved in the delivery of these products. Terminal automation that is in use now is near to being totally unmanned. Functions that this system performs include security, vehicle identification, inventory control, safety control, audit features, event alarms, reporting and others.
In a terminal there are usually several oil or gas products that can be delivered from the facility to transportation vehicles that will move the products to the final market delivery point. There are loading bays that can be positioned for the automated dispensing of a selected product into a vehicle. This vehicle can be a mobile transport device like a tanker truck, a river barge, or a rail tank car. When being loaded into a vehicle total product control is in effect from the terminal automation. Metering of the dispensed product is kept exact by the system. A computer monitoring system is constantly aware of the amount of the product dispensed at any time. The system has safety shutdown capability in place that will close down any dispensing if the terminal automation system detects any event that is out of the ordinary.
As a vehicle enters the facility to be filled with product the terminal system is aware of the presence of the vehicle. Each vehicle is required to have an RFID type card attached to the outside of the vehicle. As the vehicle moves around in the facility, the terminal automation system is aware of the location of the vehicle at all times. The tare weight, which is the weight of the vehicle without product in it, is read by the terminal automation system when the vehicle enters the facility. The system tracks the customer that owns the vehicle, what product it is to transport, and the volume of that product. The system will keep a vehicle from picking up the wrong product because of this.
When the truck arrives at the dispenser where the product will be loaded into the vehicle, the controller of the terminal automated system will dispense the exact amount of product required. The system has produced a filling advice notice that tells the product name, amount of the product, the customer, the destination, and the price of the product. As the product is dispensed into the vehicle, the amount of the product is automatically removed from the inventory of the terminal by the automation system. If the pricing of the product to the customer is based on the weight of the product, then the weight of a product-filled vehicle would be taken when the vehicle is ready to leave the facility.
Once the inventory level of the terminal has reached a certain warning point after delivering product to customers for some time, a notice is issued from the automation system that there is a need for more of the product to be delivered to the terminal for delivery to the vehicles of customers. This warning advice will cause a request for more product to be delivered to the terminal from a tank farm, if it is the source. The advice could also request a delivery of the product from a more remote location through a pipeline. A pipeline can also be the “vehicle” through which product may be delivered to a customer. The terminal system can dispense product of a predetermined amount through a pipeline from the terminal facility to a customer location. The pipeline can be used to transport many different types of products. To do this the facility will setup the product to start running through the pipeline at a given time. The volume of the pipeline from one location to another is known by the system. As product flows from the facility to the customer, the system calculates the exact amount that is required to fill the order that the customer placed for this product. Once that amount is in the pipeline, then the system terminates the dispensing of the product. Similar to the truck or barge deliveries, there is an invoice remitted for the product that is dispensed through the pipeline.
All of the processes that are accomplished to deliver, count, invoice, inventory, and control the product that are moved to and from the terminal are all controlled by the controllers of the terminal automation system. With such a system in place it is very difficult to have the wrong product or product amount delivered to a customer by any vehicle, the control by the system is too accurate.
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