Fuel theft prevention and fuel level monitoring

 

Remote sites, hosting fuel tanks, pose unique challenges to the organization. Unattended sites may suffer from a combination of five threats:
• Fuel leakage
Slow leakage can easily go unnoticed, but integrated over time and over hundreds of sites will result in losses measured in tens of thousand of dollars per month.
• Fuel theft
An unauthorized entry to the remote site creates a risk that should be prevented or at least handled on the aftermath. Unauthorized entry is likely to result in fuel theft and equipment being stolen, both having gloomy financial consequences.
• Premature fuel dry-out
Fuel may be drained out from the tank, leaving the site either non-operational or consuming backup energy sources. Both prospects are costly to the organization. Ensuring just-in-time refueling is the optimum solution in this case.
• Inaccurate fuel refilling
Refueling process tends to be inaccurate. The reported fuel quantities may be appreciably different than those actually being transferred to the site. This may result in considerable overpayment to suppliers.
• Un-tuned generators
Generators need retuning, filter cleaning and other maintenance operations to operate efficiently. Periodic maintenance may not be sufficient to catch a defective generator on-time and prevent excessive fuel consumption. On-line fault detection is the modern efficient

Managing unattended fuel tanks

The key to efficient management of fuel tanks in unattended sites is our four component solution:

• Continuous measurement of fuel level

• Wireless communication link to a central control station

• Intelligent data analysis

• Automated reporting

Continuous measurement of fuel level is enabled by the use of ultrasonic, radar or pressure level meters. An appropriate system must be selected to the specific site, depending on characteristics such as tank dimensions, fuel level span, type of fuel (e.g. explosive prone or not), temperature range and more.

GSM based wireless communications provides a global, practical, cost-effective solution for wide-area monitoring. Means for linking the level meter systems to a local GSM modem over digital or analog (4-20) interface are provided at each site. Enhancements to GSM inherent non-reliable communication link are included in the central control station.

Data analysis is tailored to identify long term fuel leakage, theft, improper fuel consumption by the generator and more. The system may also be tuned to identify tempering with the monitoring equipment on-site. Data analysis also optimizes the balance between false alarm rates and alarm latencies.

Event reporting at the control station incorporates a combination of graphs per site, on-screen pop-up alarms and remote messaging to site supervisors.