Established by Shell and Qatar Petroleum in 2006, Pearl GTL is the largest gas to liquids facility on the planet. Gas to liquids (GTL) is the conversion of natural gas to liquid fuels and other products, including gasoil, naphtha, kerosene, normal-paraffin and lubricants. Pearl GTL has a capacity of 140,000 barrels per day of these products and 120,000 barrels per day of liquefied petroleum gas, and the data produced by its quality control program is tremendous: More than 30,000 content, volume, emissions and equipment measurements are transmitted at any given time. With the integrity of its brand, the safety of its workers, and the profitability of its enterprise on the line, Pearl GTL needed a laboratory information management system (LIMS) to manage, analyze and integrate the data that keeps this facility functioning securely and efficiently. Data management: The facility’s huge volume of quality control data needed to be collected, stored organized, integrated, and analyzed to ensure product quality, plant and customer safety, environmental protection, and production efficiency. Regulatory compliance: Pearl GTL needed to comply with standards such as ISO 17025 —an international standard for how sampling labs manage data collection, security, instrumentation, traceability, and personnel—and to retrieve data demonstrating compliance in the event of an audit. Communication: Test data from multiple sources needed to be fully integrated with a variety of systems including operations management, batch tracking, and ERP systems. With so many prerequisites for success, Pearl GTL needed a proven solution. The LIMS they chose enhances Pearl GTL’s operational performance in the following ways: Automation and error elimination: The LIMS is integrated with an operations management system (known as OTTER), process historian (PI), an oil movement and batch tracking system, laboratory instruments, and other production systems to provide real time results to all relevant parties within the PI system. Faster production and reporting: The LIMS enables Pearl GTL’s oil movement and batch tracking system to notify panel operators of test results as soon as they are issued. Operators can move oil to new tanks in preparation for shipping right away, minimizing demurrage charges for loading delays that can cost as much as $35,000 per day. Integrating the field with the lab: The LIMS helps Pearl GTL operators collect data from the field more efficiently for analysis in the lab. Using the OTTER system, all sample points in the field are marked with radio frequency identification tags. When field operators perform sample rounds, a handheld computer guides them to each sample point and then automatically records the required information, whether the sampling task is routine or non-routine. Enhanced Compliance and Safety: Finally, the LIMS ensures that Pearl GTL can demonstrate compliance with ISO 17025 and other standards. Read the complete case study, The World’s Largest Gas to Liquids Facility Runs on Thermo Scientific SampleManager LIMS.
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