ADNOC’s state-of-the-art Panorama digital command centre has been the gateway to the company’s digital transformation, said Abdul Nasser Al Mughairbi, ADNOC’s SVP Digital at the AVEVA World Summit held in Singapore in September
Giving a keynote presentation on ADNOC’s digital transformation story, Al Mughairbi described how ADNOC is using big data technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) to help extract maximum value from its assets and resources and achieve its business and operational targets. Based on AVEVA’s wonderware ecostructure, Panorama is a unified operations centre featuring around 200 dashboards from which unified real-time data across ADNOC’s entire value chain is available at the touch of a button, captured, analysed and incorporated into decision making.
“For the first time time, ADNOC had a full report of its production – not just oil, gas and petrochemicals, but how much we have above ground, not just in our storage facilities in the UAE but also in India and Japan,” said Al Mughairbi.
“That took us into an era when all of a sudden visibility was there. …data is now available to everyone in real time. The production of Bu Hasa, one of the most remote plants in the desert, is now visible. Flaring is now visible. Energy consumption is visible, KPIs are visible.
“This visibility and transparency are important, because that’s the cultural shift we are looking for, with everything out in the open. It created a paradigm shift in our culture and digital transformation. ” It also had the effect of getting ADNOC’s management and people buying in to the digital transformation journey, he added.
Discussing how ADNOC’s operations are being transformed, Al Mughairbi said, “We’re using data and machine learning to optimise production, improve efficiency, reduce risk and derisk multibillion dollar projects.” ADNOC is also using blockchain for hydrocarbon accounting and speeding up transactions, he noted, pointing out that ADNOC companies interchange products continuously on a daily basis.
“Now, people know exactly how much product has gone from one company to another, in real time, and there is no need for verification because it is there on blockchain.” This raises interesting possibilities. “Can we track a module of hydrocarbons from the wellhead to the customer? Can we stamp it with its carbon footprint, can we verify its quality?”
“That’s just the beginning,” he said, adding that Panorama is stimulating new ideas from the ADNOC team as well as from visitors to the centre.
See our exclusive interview with Abdul Nasser Al Mughairbi in the forthcoming ADIPEC issue of Oil Review Middle East.
