The oil and gas industry remains one of the most largest, important and lucrative of Australian industries; with oil and gas inspection one of the cornerstones of its scale.
The annual Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association (APPEA) conference celebrates a culmination of oil and gas technology, companies and projects which seek to change the industry. Of fundamental importance to everyone involved in the oil and gas industry is safety and management. Proper maintenance, compliance and safety inspection is vital to ensure all oil and gas activities are performing at optimum levels. Workplace safety is imperative in any industry but especially so when handling highly flammable resources and working within risk enhanced environments. The need for thorough and accurate oil and gas inspection has never been so important.
Oil and gas inspection requires both detailed techniques and measurements to collect data. Paper checklists have dominated inspections with no viable alternative until the introduction of mobile devices. Rugged devices and intrinsically safe devices with ATEX/IECEx Zone 1 and Zone 2 approval are available as fully-fledged smartphones with powerful functionalities. Paperless inspection solutions are becoming more and more widespread within the field, boasting a wide array of features for inspectors and officers to utilise as well as providing powerful data. Users can take advantage of the camera on the smartphone/tablet alongside speech-to-text services, touchscreen annotation and barcode scanning. Offline recording and GPS timestamps means that inspectors aren’t restricted whilst attachment of reference material in the form of previous reports, manuals and data etc., ensure that they aren’t left bewildered.
