Protection of black gold

An integrated security system composed of cameras, access controls and vehicle identification that transmit over a wireless network, provide security to the Petroecuador Pipeline Management, in the province of Esmeraldas.

By Ana María Restrepo

Since ancient times, before Christ, oil exists on earth, but only 200 years ago it began to be used. The first references to oil can be traced back to the presence of gas vapors that spontaneously ignited from the ground.

On other occasions, it manifested itself in the water and was collected and used to cure skin diseases or to give massages. Those who attributed this medicinal use to him were the Egyptians, although they also used it for mummifications and as oil for the wheels of their carriages (taken from rincondelvago.com).

In other places such as Babylon, it was used as fuel and to join stones in their constructions; in Sicily it was mineral oil for lamps and in Baghdad it was used for lighting; however, the first oil exploiters were the Chinese who used bamboo drills to search for black gold where it seemed suitable.

Many years later, in 1859, Edwin L. Drake, an American businessman drilled a well to extract oil in Oil Creek, a town near Titusville, Pennsylvania, in order to obtain kerosene for lighting.

Over time, oil deposits were discovered in Romania, Poland, Russia, the Sunda Islands and in much of the United States. In Russia the first wells were drilled between 1806 and 1819, while in Canada and Germany they began in 1857.

Currently the oil-exporting countries are Algeria, Angola, Nigeria, United Arab Emirates, Indonesia, Libya, Qatar, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Gabon, Mexico, Sudan, Brazil, Norway, Russia, Kazakhstan, Oman and Egypt.

Latin Oil

In Latin America oil has become one of the most exploited natural resources, in Venezuela, Brazil, Mexico and Ecuador this black gold has become one of the largest generators of income in these states.

In Ecuador, the main oil operator is Petroecuador, (State Oil Company of Ecuador), which was created in 1989 in order to carry out the use of hydrocarbons in the country and in the territorial sea.

Today Petroecuador is made up of three subsidiary companies: Petroproducción, where the exploration and exploitation of hydrocarbons is carried out; Petroindustrial, where refining takes place; and Petrocomercial, where the transport and commercialization of refined products in the domestic market is coordinated.

Due to the importance of the company and the need to comply with the requirements of the implementation of the protection measures stipulated in the EPIP (Port Facility Security), and PPIP (Port Facility Security Plans) of the Terminal facilities to be declared a safe port; Petroecuador's directives decided to install a complete security system in the maritime security area of the Balao Maritime Terminal of the Petroecuador Pipeline Management, in the province of Esmeraldas.

Additionally, the esmeraldas area is not highly safe, since it is very close to the border with Colombia, a place dominated by the guerrillas of that country; for this reason it was necessary to increase the security levels of this site, which represents the highest economic income for Ecuador.

Certified extraction

The trans-Ecuadorian pipeline (Sote) has a pumping capacity of 360,000 barrels of oil per day for crude of 23.7 API (crude density) and 390000 BPD (international crude transport unit).  The length of the pipeline is 450 km on land and 7 km under the sea. It has an installed capacity of 103,650 HP (horsepower) and an onshore oil storage capacity of 5,220,000 barrels (8 tanks of 250,000 barrels)

The Balao Esmeraldas Maritime Terminal has two monobuoys to simultaneously load up to ships of 100,000 dwt (deadweight tons).

It should be noted that Petroecuador has the ISO 14001 Environmental Management System Certification and as a strategic objective it has to certify the environmental management systems, occupational health and safety iso 14001: 2004 and Ohsasa 18001: 2007 standards.

Black Gold Surveillance

Taking into account the objectives of the company and to comply with safety requirements, the new protection system installed by Siaproci Cia Ltda., Ingeniería y Servicios, consists of an integrated IP CCTV system, access control by hand geometry reading, vehicular income per vehicle TAG reader, and as a means of transmission a wireless system.

Patricio Fustillos, sales manager of Siaprocí, affirms that "to achieve this required the detailed engineering, provision of equipment and software, installation, configuration, operational tests, commissioning and operational training of the Maritime Protection area of the Balao Maritime Terminal, of the Petroecuador Pipeline Management in the province of Esmeraldas, Ecuador".

This security solution covers different areas within the facilities such as the administrative area, workshops, warehouses, operational area and camp.

To achieve this installation, different subsystems were addressed and installed, such as the 12 IP66 Lenel brand 320X zoom outdoor speed dome cameras, which were located on galvanized folding poles 9 meters high, and which communicate wirelessly with the control center.

The people access control system is based on handkey geometry biometric reading for plant staff and HID cards for visitors and contractors. Access is given through a windlass at the front door, and for the administrative units, to the scada room and security monitoring by biometric readers. Meanwhile, vehicular access control relies on remote TAG readers for company vehicles and contractors. "These remote TAGS reading units are Nepad AVI brand with RF technology that allow vehicles to be recognized and registered when they approach the main entrance door," explains Fustillos.

The means of transmission through a telecommunications network is made up of wireless links that will allow the sending and receiving of information sent from remote sites to the control center.

On the other hand, to achieve the integration of all subsystems in an adequate platform that allows combined operations of access and CCTV, both for monitoring and for the recording of events, the Lenel platform was chosen.

Likewise, the installation and provision of a monitoring center, monitoring screens, the Lenel security server, monitoring clients, winding center and integration of all subsystems was carried out.

What's new for the pipeline

Previously in the pipeline facilities there was no security system that protected the facilities, this new set of solutions has changed not only the perception of safety in the entity, but the environment and working conditions.

Before starting the installation, the company held a tender to launch a CCTV system with analog cameras, access in critical areas and reading of vehicle license plates, but installed as independent systems.

For this porposit Siaprocí and Lenel joined and presented to Petroecuador a fully integrated system where the entire system, CCTV, access and vehicle entry would be managed in a single database and operation screen, which was approved by the oil company.

Technical conditions

At the beginning of the installation of the project, the cameras were located on nine-meter poles, at strategic points designated by the client according to their needs.

The Sales Manager of Siaproci comments that for the feeding of each camera a ground point was made, and a stainless steel board grade IP66 60*60*40 mm was placed where the camera source and a surge protection element for the source were installed. The power connections for each chamber are made from the nearest power board, via a UPS. Additionally in the upper part of the pole a Motorola canopy radio subscriber was installed, and the source of the aforementioned radio was also installed in the stainless steel board and a surge protection element for the radio.

These cameras are configured with the standard Pelco D protocol. Lenel cameras allow control over their bandwidth; In addition, being IP and with multicasting capacity, they make it possible to properly tune all transmissions. It should be noted that from the control center or from any network point with adequate access, cameras and transmission radios can be configured.

Outdoor cameras were also installed IP Speed dome digital, model ICT 240, which work in full D1 resolution (704 * 480 NTSC) with high precision, and also use the advanced ixBR encoding that makes the streams more fluid because the data is encoded and sent at a constant speed. They also have a 1/4" Sony ExView CCD lens and day/night filters. These units, classified IP66, have 26X motorized zoom and 12X digital zoom , can work at a maximum of 30 frames per second at D1 resolution, have bandwidth control for transmission over the network, also process motion detection and firing of external alarms, for which they have included four alarm inputs and two output relays.

These cameras support a wide variety of communication protocols, have a rotational speed of 350 degrees continuous per second in Pan and 0-90 degrees of Tilt.

Controlled vehicular and pedestrian entry

The accesses, as mentioned above, are divided into pedestrian and vehicular, which are located in strategic areas that need to be controlled and monitored due to their importance within the company.

Also for the protection of the scada control room, the security room where the CCTV consoles and accesses are, and the main entrance to administration, fixed IP cameras Lenel brand were placed directly connected to the wireless communication channels.

Handheld geometry readers were used for access control. In the main checkpoint two readers were installed (one for the entrance and one for the exit), in addition to a windlass. Similarly, the entrance of the administration building, the pipeline operation room and the security monitoring room share a handheld geometry reader for entry to each of the secure areas, which are monitored by surveillance cameras.

"As an advantage, handkey handheld readers connect directly to Lenel access panels. The connection is made for the handkey keyboard by wiegand and for biometric data the RS485 port is used. The biometrics database is saved in the access manufacturer's dashboards and no other parallel software is required to configure them." Fustillos explains. He also comments that in the control center a single biometric winding is carried out and through the same network structure it reaches the access panels located in the different sites, allowing a centralized management of the biometrics of the employees. These access systems also communicate with the control center over a wireless network.

For the control of cars, a vehicle TAG reader was installed, using Nepad AVI brand equipment connected to the Lenel panels.

"At the main entrance door, two readers were placed, one for entry vehicles and one for exit vehicles. In the company's vehicles, tags are placed on tag holders on the windshield of the same. The functionality created is such that when a vehicle is going to leave, the control room is alerted in the operation screens, and the vehicle that is leaving is displayed; previously, a manual register was kept on vehicles entering and vehicles leaving. Currently everything is recorded in the system being able to carry a very simple report to obtain and a database saved on these events, "says Patrico.

For its part, in the control center the Motorola Access point Canopy was installed to collect the data of all subscribers, which is connected to a local switch . This center has an NVR licensed for 16 IP cameras, a Lenel OnGuard application server to which two operation screens are connected, additionally an OnGuard client also with two monitors connected to the same CPU.

In software is installed an OnGuard server with sufficient liciencias that integrates Access, CCTV and an identity manager and visitor control, with support for 25,000 users and 32 access readers.

Likewise, OnGuard's information search software is extremely advanced allowing you to locate information quickly with related videos and includes intelligent video for data search.

Another advantage of the solution is that it integrates with the OPC communication protocols its SCADA system, allowing the exchange of critical information.

Solutions that will continue

The new security solutions such as CCTV, access control and asset control are integrated and work in parallel facilitating the functions of the company, however for the very near future we also want to integrate the loading operation of the ships in the marine buoys with a camera located in the buoy and communication to land, access control in the port and security in the storage tank area, as Fustillos explains.

He also comments that when implementing the system there were no great difficulties because there was a good planning of detailed engineering coordinated with the client, which practically solved the problems during the work.

The location of the area and its large size drove the choice of wireless technology because almost all wired installations have experienced problems, the humidity is extremely high which supported the decision to install an wireless solution.

Although the installation and implementation of this security project is new, Petroecuador is very satisfied, to such an extent that it is intended to use this same security structure for the entire organization.