Abstract
The Malampaya Deepwater Gas-to-Power project, the single biggest industrial investment to date in the Philippines, supplies clean, environment-friendly fuel to service 30% of Luzon's power generation requirements. Subsea wells and a manifold gather gas and liquid and control the flow to a shallow water platform. Here, gas and condensate are separated before transporting dry gas through a 504 km long pipeline to an onshore gas plant. A key challenge of the Malampaya offshore facility is to maintain a smooth, continuous operation under varying demands of gas delivery from the onshore gas plant, which often leads to slugging at low flow rates.
This paper focuses on the successful implementation of Halliburton's advanced process automation solutions to improve operation of the offshore platform. The applied solutions include advanced control applications to better control production and the operation of the methanol recovery column and an alarm management system to improve the effectiveness of the alarm system that enables the operators to better respond to abnormal operating conditions.
A core principle of the advanced control application for production control is to maximize the use of topside installed capacity to better handle production rate changes while maintaining the stability of the export gas compressor and the liquid processing equipments, particularly at low production levels.
As part of the implementation of the advanced control applications, some advanced regulatory control improvements to the compressor systems were required to automate speed control for the compressor and to reduce recycling.
The alarm management system allows regular analysis of alarm activity and identifies "bad actors". The project included the execution of a rigorous alarm rationalization procedure, which reduced the number of unnecessary alarms considerably and allowed the operator to focus on the needed areas of action during abnormal operation.
Significant tangible and intangible benefits have been identified as a result of the implemented solutions. These benefits included increases in production, stemming from improved process stability, and reduction of environmental risks from the methanol column operation and better alarm reaction times. This case study highlights the value that advanced process automation can bring to the upstream industry.
