São Paulo- Before coming to the surface and moving vehicles and machinery, oil is found deep under the earth or sea and needs a series of pipelines for extraction. For this, they must be in perfect condition, with no risk of leaks, and undamaged. It is in this sector that consultancy company Prima7s works. The organisation put on the market some software to provide detailed analysis of integrity of these pipelines.
The software arose from the doctoral thesis in Metallurgical Engineering by José de Jesús Leal Carvajalino, from the Pontifical Catholic University (PUC) of Rio de Janeiro. With another three partners, José Luiz de França Freire, Marco Antonio Pérez Rosas and Leonardo Dantas Rodrigues, they set up Prima7s and started offering services for management of the integrity of industrial plants, analysis of trustworthiness and repair of pipelines.
"Pipelines must be inspected periodically. For this, PIGs, tools that go along the pipeline looking for defects, are generally used. With the software, we analyse all possible information to see whether it will continue operating, for how long, and we also suggest actions for risk reduction,” said Leonardo Rodrigues.
According to Rodrigues, who is a master in Mechanical Engineering, the main differential of the Prima7s software as against others sold on the market is the volume of information supplied on the report. “What we see in other tools is that the evaluation reports do not take into consideration possible variations. In our tool, all statistical variables are considered, to analyse any failure possibility. We do not work on determinist analyses,” he pointed out. "We are also always aware of new technologies for calculation and participate in congresses,” he said.
The company does not sell the software, which is only used in its own consultancy work. In Brazil, they provide consultancy to companies like Petrobras, Transpetro and Vale. Abroad, they have already provided services in Bolivia and are negotiating a contract in Chile.
Prima7s does not develop the pipeline inspection work, but analyses the data collected by other companies. Thus, says Rodrigues, it is possible to develop remote analysis in distant regions, like the Middle East, for example. "If a company in the Middle East does the inspection and sends the figures to us, we may analyse them,” he said. Despite never having provided services in the region, he says he is interested in attracting Arab customers. "The Middle East is always interesting for those working in the area of oil. We see the region as a good alternative.”
Contact
Prima7s
Tel.: (+55 21) 4106-0049
E-mail: contato@prima7s.com
Site: www.prima7s.com
*Translated by Mark Ament
