Sarnia-Lambton, ON, Canada – A new software program could save pipeline owners time in the field and money by providing detailed information about the line.
There are hundreds of kilometers of pipelines under the ground in Sarnia-Lambton dating back 60 years or more. Marty Raaymakers of MIG Engineering has an entire basement of file folders and boxes of maps to prove there is an ocean of information available about the lines, but it is difficult to access.
Raaymakers and David Grant of CanWeb, both members of the Sarnia Lambton Industrial Alliance, have been talking for years about how to solve the information problem with innovative software. But recent provincial legislation, an aging workforce and improvements in technology spurred them on to form the company Pipeintel Inc. (www.pipeintel.com), and develop ground breaking software.
Raaymakers says passage of Bill 8 requires all companies with pipelines near public land to register with Ontario One Call. “We work with companies on locates all the time. I used to get two to three calls a week from companies looking for help. Now we get two to three per day.”
And Grant says each day, people are retiring from local industries, and taking valuable knowledge about the pipelines with them. “The normal way to transfer the information was people with the experience passed it down…Joe knows because Joe was there,” says Grant. He adds that when people retire, that knowledge “walks out the door.”
When Raaymakers and Grant first considered the idea, they couldn’t find the technology needed to provide the product they wanted. But with the advent of the tablet and the software which drives it, the pair has been able to come up with software called Pipeintel, which they refer to as pipeline knowledge management.
Companies would buy the software and have their pipeline data loaded onto it. Workers could take their cell phones or tablets into the field, type in the pipeline number and access all kinds of information including pipe property data, maps, aerial photography, legal and alignment surveys, and even government regulations or past work orders on the line.
Raaymaker says that information can now take hours to find but with Pipeintel, workers would have it instantly in the field. He adds Pipeintel can also be used for locates, for emergency response, maintenance, inspections and legal departments.
And he says the information can be shared between companies. “All the Sarnia industries do business with each other,” says Raaymakers, noting sometimes they use each other’s existing pipelines. Raaymakers says Pipeintel will allow companies to share as little or as much information as they want. “These companies want different levels of access…some wouldn’t want everyone to know everything about their pipeline. They will be able to control the amount of information available to others.”
“All the companies have systems (data on their pipelines). This will tie it all into one system and helps them make what they’re doing better,” says Raaymakers.
And while the pair plan to market it first to pipeline users, Grant says other companies will be able to use it as well, including fibre optic networks, rail lines and municipal services, “Anything with lines on a map.”
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Contact: Marty Raaymakers at 519-337-8000 or David Grant at 519-332-6900
Posted in: SLEP News