Alamy via Reuters
Kuwait’s first-time use of drones to inspect oil and gas facilities has reduced costs, improved operational efficiency and enhanced worker safety, a local newspaper has reported, without giving numbers.
The drones are used to inspect oil and gas fields, petrochemical and refining facilities, and pipelines and export terminals across the country, the Arabic-language daily Alanba said, citing unnamed “responsible” sources.
The paper said that Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC), which manages the country’s hydrocarbon sector, is pushing the use of the new technology by its affiliated companies, including its main upstream and downstream operators – Kuwait Oil Company and Kuwait National Petroleum Company.
The drones “contribute to reducing the need to temporarily suspend operations during inspection, to cutting operational costs by reducing reliance on manual inspections and the use of scaffolding and heavy equipment, and to enhancing the level of safety by reducing workers’ exposure to risks in complex industrial environments,” the newspaper said, without indicating when the drones were first used and in what numbers.
The drones can “conduct detailed inspections of facilities in record time, while providing accurate data in real time, which helps in making quick and effective decisions,” the report said.
Kuwait has the world’s fifth-largest oil reserves, estimated at around 101 billion barrels.
It is investing $30 billion to increase oil-production capacity by as much as 40 percent by as early as 2035, bringing it close to four million barrels per day (bpd), KPC managing director Khaled Al Sabah said at an energy conference last month.
Current capacity is 2.8 million bpd.