The Use of Geographic Information System to Managing Results of ILI (Inline Inspections) and Repairs in Transpetro’s Pipelines

It is quite significant the effort given by firms to utilize all of the GIS potential. The GIS is more than a mapping information system, it is a powerful management device that should be explored to add value to firm’s management efforts. It is by fact that with the advances in new information technology, aligned with the facilities of the Internet has significantly contributed to push forward GIS projects into big firms. GIS has also become the new aim to software suppliers worldwide. TRANSPETRO has been investing heavily in geo-processing technology to guarantee a technological competitive edge. The firm believes that Geographical Information Systems will be an important contributor to the improvement of its management efforts on their terminals and pipeline network. The use of intelligent tools (smart pig) for inspections of pipelines’ integrity (ILI inspection) has been intensified by those advanced technologies observed in this specialized activity. In general, right after the reports of the inspections, the results are analyzed thoroughly by qualified professionals in this area. These specialists are responsible for attesting the results supplied by consultants that execute the inspection in the fields. Those reports and results are constantly checked by field correlations involving a number of inspection teams. Once accepted, the database is carefully analysed through technical criteria involving the severity of the defects indicated in the internal and external surfaces of the pipeline. The use of GIS tools for this kind of analysis is extremely important because it also allows specialist to analyze every kind of geographical data, such as rivers and sensitive environmental areas, among others. When those tests are finally finished a repair order is sent to the field professionals. Once again, the use of GIS is extremely important for support those locations of interference areas as well as the planning of the interventions in the roads, channels or points to be repaired. All of those actions, defects analyzed and the field applications are perfectly managed by the GIS technology, storing all of those strategic information in the database of Transpetro’s specialists. In this paper we intend to present the applications of this technology that analyzes the intelligent tools (smart pig) results in the field works with the GIS developed by Transpetro.