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Ken: Great to have you in the Aurecon organisation as our technical director focused on rotating machines. And I was reflecting the other day on your, I guess, direct experience in the CSG industry and how the application of rotating machines is a little bit different to the conventional application.
Prashant: Yes, CSG particularly being unconventional gas, as we call it, is characterised by being a geospatial problem. So, we are moving molecules of gas for several hundreds of kilometers. And when the gas is being produced at a ground of a car tire pressure. So the compression, is the equipment by which we impart energy to the molecules and enable its movement to the power plant or to the destination LNG trains. And that's where it differs from conventional gas.
And how we then impart that energy in terms of intensity, and in terms of how it's brought about, in terms of its architecture, it has a bearing on multiple decisions, in that project affecting its economics. So, where it really then matters in terms of assets and operations is given the need to maximise interchangeability, the industry pursues having a standard piece of kit that goes all across the map. And this is where we’ve got to then recognise the peculiarities of a particular location, the role of that operating envelope, and its interactions with the upstream and downstream unit operations, the demands of particular operations itself, in terms of operating envelopes at that location, and as well as even seasonality.
And that is where it creates, the need to look at it from different dimensions, and I suppose that is where we bring value. And that is where the potential to further unlock value in existing assets is there, is to overlay this understanding of approaching the nominal capacity in terms of different dimensions and thereby deliver solutions which unlock value in terms of reinterpreting the operating envelopes as well as helping our customers redefine the produce to mimic diagrams.
Ken: I recall you saying to me the other day, you're super passionate about the analytics that can support some of that and some of the great work that you've done in the past around advanced statistical data collection and analysis to enhance and support that. Can you touch on that a little bit?
Prashant: So, compression and the energy required to drive these compressors. So, where the core piece of kit comes from OEM’s, its performance is greatly affected by the different parts and components that make the whole system. That includes the gas coolers, the drive systems, the lubrication systems, and various of the interfacing elements. And when we think of that problem then from the interrelationships perspective, there is a need to not only look at the operating parameters of the machine, but also look at some of the engineered features. These are created in the analytical realm, in the digital realm. And those features then enable us to view the machine performance with a different eye.
When applying advanced statistical methods or machine learning techniques, we can then derive messages which can tell us whether there's any degradation pattern, the rate of such degradations, which then allows us to plan certain activities for the machine particulars, and as well as look at the whole asset performance. From a perspective of maximising its run length, whilst planning for anything unplanned that might be coming our way, these advanced techniques really help us understand the operating asset a lot better than mere instruments that are just telling us.
