In the future, a special sensor system could be used to automatically monitor kilometers of pipeline for signs of damage resulting from either wear and tear or vandalism. Researchers from Siemens Corporate Technology are now working on a new generation of such sensors. One potential field of application is the Russian oil and gas industry in Siberia.

This area is rich in mineral resources and has countless production locations and thousands of kilometers of pipeline strewn throughout the tundra. As these are often far removed from any infrastructure and difficult to access due to freezing temperatures in winter and swamp like conditions in summer, they are generally monitored by remote systems that feature hard-wired sensors.
In the future, however, new wireless sensors developed by Corporate Technology in Munich will be able to detect not only defects but also intentional damage on the basis of a fall in pressure in the pipeline or the sound of banging or digging. Moreover, thanks to intelligent software, they are also able to monitor the status of production equipment such as pumps or compressors on the basis of their vibration characteristics or other data such as temperature and oil level. In what is a new departure in pipeline monitoring, they will therefore be able to report abnormalities before an actual defect occurs.

Independent radio sensors are mounted every 100 meters of pipeline. Any irregularities are radioed from one sensor to the next, thus obviating the need for high transmission capacity and a large supply of energy. This also accelerates radio communications to valve stations, which are installed at gaps of between 25 and 40 kilometers along the pipeline and equipped with network contact to a control center.

Furthermore, the sensors are able to switch certain of their functions over to standby, which results in additional energy savings. At the same time, they feature an integrated microprocessor that analyses and compresses all data received before transmitting only the most necessary information, thus reducing the volume of data communications.

This research is part of a project by the name of ZESAN, which focuses on the development of failsafe and energy-efficient sensor and actuator networks. It is sponsored by Germany’s Federal Ministry of Education and Research and involves cooperation between a number of competence centers at Corporate Technology and various partners from the private and public sectors.