What is Oil and Gas Automation?

Deloitte recently reported that approximately 60% of oil and gas companies had implemented digital transformation projects that focus specifically on digital processes involving human tasks.

Despite this impressive statistic, from regularly talking with this sector we know there is still a huge amount of oil and gas automation to be undertaken and a lot of associated pain exists.

Disconnected and distributed sites, a global skills shortage, and pressures to improve productivity and sustainability compliance are ideal opportunities for the oil and gas industry to tackle process automation head-on.

In this blog, I discuss why automation is trending in terms of priority and importance, the challenges that might hold you back, and some examples of use cases for digitalization.

What is Oil and Gas Automation?

Oil and gas automation refers to the use of advanced technology, software, and machinery to streamline and optimize operations within the oil and gas industry. This can include automating tasks in exploration, drilling, production, refining, and transportation. Through automation, companies can monitor equipment in real-time, enhance safety by reducing manual intervention in hazardous environments, and improve accuracy in data collection and analysis. Oil and gas automation aims to increase efficiency, reduce costs, minimize risks, and enhance productivity across the entire supply chain.

Examples of Oil and Gas Automation

Automating Health & Safety Processes

By further automating health and safety processes, companies can significantly improve risk management, compliance, operational efficiency, and overall safety of their employees and contractors.

Some health & safety processes automated by our customers include:

• safety based observations

• site inspections

• safety checklists

• incident investigations
  
  

Automating Operational Processes

Operational processes are usually the first ones to be prioritized for our customers in the oil and gas industry, processes that have been top of the list include:

• contract management

• fleet management

• procurement

• onboarding employees and contractors

• permit to work

• change management

Key Trends of Oil and Gas Automation 

Demand for Operational Efficiency

We recently held an oil and gas automation focus group with C Levels across the United States and Europe, a key trend among the participants was a need for their organizations to become smarter, improve efficiency, and solve the fundamental problems that stand in the way of better bottom-line performance. They want better visibility and transparency of operations and have processes followed and standardized.

One participant indicated "I would like to learn how to use real time data to improve operational efficiency. How to gather, showcase, and apply data to make better decisions. My sector is labor intensive – we are always delivering a tailored service. Key aspects for us to take advantage of oil and gas automation, are how we gather information, whether it is correct, and its visibility to make better decisions. We want to standardize processes without losing business agility".

Another stated "We have tonnes of paper processes. Operational excellence and digitalization are key for us. We want to streamline workflows, get workers to collect data, and leverage technology to improve operational excellence and save time."

Oil and gas automation is proven to help organizations automate tasks so that the processes are standardized and that the information collected is validated to ultimately improve productivity by processes running much smoother and also freeing up staff to work on more value-adding tasks.

Business processes automated through products like FlowForma run much faster and can be easily analyzed within the tool for continuous improvements. Our clients benefit from fewer mistakes and the associated costs of rework.

A significant portion of failures and errors in standard tasks within Oil & Gas can be attributed to human error – 60-80%. By standardizing processes and validating the data along with audit trails, this statistic can be drastically reduced.

Read the Dresser Natural Gas Case Study

Data Accuracy Requirement

As per the conversations in our recent roundtable, data is a trending topic. Attendees want to empower staff to collect data, seamlessly validate this data, and report on it in real-time for decision-making and continuous improvement.

Data accuracy is critical for the oil and gas sector especially related to health & safety, compliance, sustainability, and maintenance.

Below is an example of a dashboard pulled from the built-in analytics feature of the FlowForma Process automation platform. Oil and gas companies can rapidly create dashboards based on the data collected in their processes to:

• continuously pinpoint areas for process improvement

• instantly identify bottlenecks and risks

• deliver actionable insights for better decision-making
  
  

Ever Increasing Regulation

Increasing regulation is a challenging trend in the oil and gas industry, impacting nearly every area of the operations and the entire supply chain. Climate change mitigation is ever-increasing, along with stakeholder pressure associated with sustainability reporting. Health and safety monitoring and reporting can be a time-consuming yet highly important task for oil and gas focus.

These increases in regulation along with many more in CSR and exploration etc. present challenges for the sector, but they should also be observed as opportunities for innovation and achieving competitive advantage.

Challenges in Automating the Oil and Gas Industry 

Skilled Labour

Research indicated that skilled labor is one of the key challenges hindering the digital transformation of the oil and gas industry, but this doesn't need to be the case. With the rising trend of no code process automation tools, IT teams, business professionals, or a fusion of both are empowered to digitalize processes at speed.

FlowForma customers tell us that they are digitalizing 4 to 10 times faster with our intuitive process automation tool than with competing products.

Resistance to Change

As with any change, there will be some resistance to change regarding oil and gas automation. Luckily this can be overcome with the correct approach to the introduction of the automation software and how employees are offered training and access to the platform.

For example, one customer recently told us they were very concerned about adoption, and had a lot of staff who had been working the same way for 20+ years with a number of these not having daily access to laptops, to address this challenge the customer utilized QR codes on the machinery to empower staff to quickly scan the QR code to access the processes they needed to update, it was a huge success.

The same customer had a unique outcome in that the digitalization of their processes across multiple sites created a competitive streak across sites, with sites competing against each other - which they could do so much easier by monitoring the dashboards on their DPA platform.

Legacy Systems

Many companies are still challenged with legacy systems, but this needn't be a blocker. Automation software has helped many companies accelerate digitalization by pulling or pushing data to and from legacy systems. Oil and gas automation tools come with ready-to-go integrations into Finance, HR, and ERP systems, etc.

Read the associated case study

In Conclusion

Oil and gas automation is no longer just a trend but a necessity for companies aiming to improve efficiency, ensure data accuracy, and comply with increasing regulations. Despite the challenges of disconnected sites, skilled labor shortages, and resistance to change, the benefits of automation are clear.

By automating processes, oil and gas companies can standardize operations, reduce errors, and make data-driven decisions in real time. This transformation not only enhances productivity and safety but also positions the oil and gas industry to meet the demands of a rapidly evolving industry.

Embracing automation tools like FlowForma can help overcome legacy system limitations and drive faster digitalization, ultimately leading to a more competitive and sustainable future for the oil and gas sector.

We have experts on hand to support you in overcoming any of the above challenges, simply book a demonstration or trial with our team today both come with one-to-one expert support.