In the entire process of development, growth and sustainability of a country’s capital and resource intensive project’s productivity, the infrastructure play a crucial role. While providing a complex structure like a nuclear power plant, an oil refinery, steel plant or any resource intensive project, the first demand is a reliable, informative ground. To achieve this, we need to have a single source of up-to-date project information, enabling Engineering, Procurement and Construction companies, Owners-operators, and other project stakeholders to share information and collaborate effectively in the project environment. The result of this is an optimized planning and execution of the project.
As per the recent survey, total investments planned for the next 15 years by the utility, energy, metal, mining and chemicals companies accounts to $60 trillion. Amid the rising demands, 40% of Energy, Process, and Utility capital projects are delivered beyond schedule, and 70% of them exceed the budget. The Greenfield or Expansion projects involves a variety of complex and interconnected activities, all of which need to be planned and coordinated between various teams for optimal results. Whether construction is for new systems or work around existing facilities while normal operations are in progress, current methodologies and tools leave room for improvement.
Challenges faced by EPU:
- Insufficient planning of processes
- Difficulty coping with changing requirement
- Poor visibility of project controls
- An inability to accurately capture the physical behavior of construction activities
As the intensive projects reach high complexity levels, we need a fresh look at how we accomplish processes and what the new solutions have to offer to advance the industry. How is this sector working to achieve these projects in time and within budget? If companies and all the stakeholders can connect with all the right data, what can be attained? How close are we to have the projects executed as per planning?
How 3D technology is beneficial for the industry?
3D solutions help you battle with these challenges by connecting the dots. Advanced 3D solutions facilitate consistency and traceability of all information and improve project ecosystem productivity by minimizing waste with respect to time, costs, and resources.
The key to streamlining the project processes is to start on the right foot, be on fast track environment by identifying the correct data. One of the most innovative ways to achieve this is to use advanced analytics to capture and analyze the sector requirements. Data analysis and availability of the right data can potentially save resources, money and time by identifying risks for the project stakeholders and the industry. Even in a single project, the industry has a considerable stake tied up and can least afford expensive delays or failures. An immersive and interactive virtual 3D environment can be used to demonstrate and analyze the operation throughout each stage. It helps the industry escape the delays and significantly alters the production economics.
Project teams, with the aid of 3D solutions, can seamlessly create, collaborate, share and manage information globally with predefined gates and milestones. 3D also helps the industry simulate construction processes as the workers can train themselves virtually. Virtual validation and training using the universal language of 3D enable development tasks to be performed right, even the first time. Managers and other stakeholders can focus on high value-added activities while real-time dynamic dashboards provide project management with scorecards, eliminating tedious tasks and processes.
The advanced 3D technology solutions help the companies plan, visualize and validate the schedule of any capital project. As a result, the company can minimize on the project delay and resource wastage. The Energy, Process, and Utility industry is leading the pack in the economic recovery and growth efforts in most countries around the world and is all set to emerge with an advantage when the crisis tides over. It’s an exciting time for the industry to rely on the new and innovative technologies that are making their way to this traditionally conservative field benefitting all the stakeholders from operations and equipment manufacturer to the engineer, from executioner to the user.
