Coming into work to seamlessly experience no mishap or issues is only wishful thinking. The reality is, working in the oil and gas sector comes with great pressure and great responsibility. Although, it may sound cliché but it is the norm as machines of these industries operate at high capacity Thus, their worth are incomparable to monetary values.

In one of the many exciting working days of The Soothsayer engineers, in early July 2018, it was similar to other days; things were going smoothly until our team of data scientists identified an odd deviation in the readings of data where the health score of a motor at a client’s ethane separation plant sunk from 100% to an unsettling score of 45%. 

Responsive action was needed to be taken, otherwise, a breakdown of the motor was inevitable. The team of engineers took no time to get to the bottom of this issue as they identified the root cause, thanks to the predictive ability of the Soothsayer. The seal and rotor of the motor were recognized as the source of this error. The malfunctioned parts caused the motor to vibrate unnaturally and the health score to drop significantly.

By understanding the root of this problem, the client benefitted in several ways. Firstly, the knowledge worked to their advantage allowing the client to approach the issue proactively and thus, ordered spare parts ahead of time. Should an actual breakdown occur, little time is wasted while waiting for spare units to arrive.

While the genuine value of the loss could not be calculated, the predictive algorithm had, as estimated by the team, saved the client a whopping 10-days worth of unplanned shutdown — from reacting to the damage of the component, to identifying the issue to restoring the condition of the motor. 

All in all, the failure was prevented in the crucial moment in July 2018 where the predictive algorithm played a huge part in the contribution.

See more successful cases from The Soothsayer