BP Honors Wireless Refinery System

BP (www.bp.com) presented a Digital & Communications Technology (DCT) Helios Award to a team that collaborated with Emerson Process Management (www.emersonprocess.com) to develop a wireless system to support refinery operations at BP’s Cherry Point facility in Washington State.

The DCT Helios award in the Performance category was issued for a wireless system that provides data on factors such as temperature, pressure, and vibration of equipment at the Cherry Point facility. According to Emerson, the BP and Emerson team that won the award developed the world”s first intrinsically safe mote-based system to capture measurements in BP”s refinery environments. Motes are sensors with built-in power, memory, and communications ability that can gather sensory input and communicate it over a self-configuring wireless network. The wireless system is designed to cut the cost of installing sensors by an order of magnitude, enabling increased monitoring to improve maintenance and safety.

BP also presented a team with its DCT Helios award in the Green category for wireless monitoring of relief valves at the company’s Carson refinery in California.