Emerson Exchange 365

A liquefied natural gas project in western Australia has realized more than $3.5 million in cost savings by strategically managing the integration of flow meters throughout its facilities.

The savings came from eliminating nearly 45,000 project hours during the outfitting of the Wheatstone LNG facility with 129 of Emerson’s Micro Motion™ Coriolis and Rosemount Vortex flow meters, said Jessica Smith, a control systems engineer with Bechtel – the engineering, procurement, construction, and commissioning contractor for the project.

To achieve these savings, Bechtel worked closely with Emerson’s Project Management Office to stay on schedule and under budget on the Wheatstone project, which is expected to help establish Australia as the world’s leading LNG supplier. Smith and Emerson Account Manager Jacob Ceasar will discuss their work on the project at the 2016 Emerson Exchange in Austin, Texas.

The Wheatstone LNG project is one of Australia’s largest resources projects. The facility is scheduled to begin processing natural gas in mid-2017 and is forecasted to create 60,000 direct and indirect local jobs and power 2.5 million households.

Through efficient management techniques such as strategic planning, streamline quoting and documentation, increased communication, and document management, Emerson delivered the flow meters correctly and on time while reducing man hours and achieving significant savings for Bechtel, Smith said.

“Bechtel and the Emerson team established communication processes that required timely responses, prioritized actions, and stakeholder accountability,” Smith said. “This consistency drove efficiencies through the entire process from purchase orders to product delivery.  Implementation of continuous process improvement best practices only improved team performance through the life of the project.”

Tasked with managing risk and keeping instrumentation aligned to the project vision, the Emerson team drew on the expertise of its employees from around the world while providing Bechtel with a dedicated team of professionals for the duration of the project, Ceasar said. The team included a project manager, a project engineer, a project administrator, and a documentation controller – all working together to manage the scope, schedule and budget of the project.

“Having a good project team in place makes a difference,” Ceasar said. “You want to approach each project with a strategy and a plan and try to execute it to the best of your abilities. We had an excellent team that was very dedicated and willing to put in the extra work to ensure the project proceeded smoothly. It’s about having a plan in place and putting forth the effort to achieve results.”

For the Wheatstone LNG project, the Emerson team was responsible for the delivery of 110 vortex flow meters and 19 Coriolis flow meters, ensuring that the devices were properly constructed for their applications. These flow meters are designed for precision liquid and gas measurement in demanding applications that require robust performance with low-maintenance needs.

During the project, Bechtel was able to eliminate nearly 34,000 order transfer hours, 10,000 project management hours, 1,000 documentation management hours, and 90 project engineering hours, Smith noted.

“When we can eliminate hours – be it project management hours, documentation hours, or engineering hours – that is money that we are saving Bechtel,” Ceasar said. “That’s really the cost savings on this project.”