Manufactory & Oil&Gas

The case study presented in this file considers the replacement of a mobile radio system in an Oil & Gas plant. For privacy and security reasons, the company has expressed a desire not to be named and for typographic purpose, we will name it “Oil Company”.
The modernization of security procedures and the need for a reliable communication system have led “Oil Company"to the realization of a new mobile radio system. After gathering the needs of “Oil Company", and as a result of inspections performed at the refinery, technical specifications were presented, and then provided, for a Motorola MOTOTRBO Capacity Plus system with DP4800EX ATEX terminals and a situation room software, called TRBOnet.
This system fully complies with the requirements, with an architectural solution that transforms the network into a robust application platform that benefits the user. 
The change introduced by the new technologies is mainly based on the two following factors:

• the system’s capacity to efficiently and rapidly coordinate and supervise the communications between the various operational units in the field; 
• the possibility to effectively use the data transmission features offered by the DMR network;
• an application capable of managing and controlling alarms and communications.

In the Oil&Gas market it is fundamental to have control and supervision of what occurs in the extraction areas. That's why the wells are controlled by remote using a specific SCADA system that allows to supervise the areas of interest in the different extraction wells located in the territory. It is not always possible to install an optical fiber network to transfer data due to high costs and obstacles faced in setting up.

A very important client requested us a different solution to create a network redundancy for the SCADA system that deals with the control and supervision of 26 gas extraction wells in Algeria. The suggested standard radio for the coverage of these wells is the TETRA. This kind of trunked radio standard is designed for medium-size areas with a high density of users and it is the most suitable to transfer the data coming from the RTU, thanks to the ‘IP packet data’ version conceived just for information transfer.

The fundamental problem is to connect two devices such as TETRA Motorola MTM800 Radio Base, that handles the transmission of data to the DCS in the control station, to thethird parts RTU, that collects data from the devices. In that specific case, the Yokogawa RTU uses the Modbus communication protocol. Therefore there is a problem of interconnection between the third parts RTU operating in the Modbus protocol and the radio network TETRA.