Countries across the globe are focusing on developing smart and efficient infrastructure, and India is no exception. A significant contributor to this has been technological innovations that have succeeded in bringing products, projects and best practices to the market, and which support advancements in infrastructure development. Technology enables the integration of government departments, planning processes, information from different sources, etc., and the creation of an intelligent and interconnected network of infrastructure services.
The Bentley Year in Infrastructure conference is a global gathering of leading executives in the world of infrastructure design, construction and operations. It features presentations and interactive sessions exploring the intersection of technology and business drivers, and how they are shaping the future of infrastructure delivery and investment returns. Bentley’s “Be Inspired Awards” programme honours the outstanding work of those that use its solutions in improving the world’s infrastructure.
At Bentley’s Year in Infrastructure 2016 event, held during November 1-3 in London, 18 Be Inspired Awards winners were chosen from 54 project finalists. Four companies/ projects from India qualified among the finalists. These were:
- Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) Limited for the requalification/life extension study of fixed offshore platform structures in the “innovation in offshore” category;
- Aecom-Dholera Special Investment Region (DSIR) for the “innovation in government” category;
- NJS Engineers India-Japan International Coope-ration Agency (JICA)-assisted Ganga Action Plan in the “innovation in network analysis” category;
- GE India Industrial Private Limited for the reverse osmosis (RO)#3 and zero liquid discharge (ZLD) system in the “innovation in water treatment plants” category.
Of these four, ONGC was the only company that emerged a winner. Given below is a snapshot of the four projects:
ONGC Limited
Requalification/Life extension study of fixed offshore platform structures, Mumbai, Maharashtra
The project involved the assessment of jacket platforms operated by ONGC for extended “fit for use” and strengthening to meet industry safety requirements. The company operates over 265 offshore platforms in the country. The analysis study for structural adequacy, however, was difficult to conduct as several offshore platforms had exceeded their design life of 25 years. Besides, safety had to be ensured as the platforms were required to be functional during the strengthening work. Given this background, ONGC required a flexible, interoperable offshore design and analysis application.
ONGC used Bentley’s SACS (design level) and SACS Collapse (ultimate strength analysis) to perform multiple analyses with parametric variations. As part of the project, an effective section calculation and member strength assessment was carried out using SACS’ dent modelling capability, which resulted in significant time savings. OGNC carried out the analysis with different strengthening options, making it easy to ascertain the failure modes of the jacket structures. For additional pile modelling, the adoption of an iterative optioneering methodology ensured an effective selection of pile sizes for providing support.
The benefits of the using these solutions for structural analysis studies were significant time savings and continued operation and revenue generation from the platforms. The use of the software solutions resulted in savings of at least 12 resource hours per platform, as well as avoided the installation of a new platform at a net cost of $25 million. The requalification and recertification of the offshore jacket structures also ensured the continued average production of around 1,000 barrels of oil per day, besides adding another 10-15 years of life to the structures.
Aecom
DSIR, Dholera, Gujarat
The objective of the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC) is to expand the country’s manufacturing and services base and develop the corridor as a “global manufacturing and trading hub”. The DSIR, being developed as part of the DMIC, has been planned over an extensive area of approximately 920 square km. This node is strategically located near the industrial cities of Vadodara, Ahmedabad, Rajkot, Surat and Bhavnagar. As part of the first phase, 22.5 square km is being constructed (at a cost of $500 million) with planning under way for the next 153 square km ($5 billion).
American multinational engineering firm AECOM, the programme manager for the SIR, is using advanced technologies to accelerate planning and decision making for the road, water and sewerage networks. The company is utilising a number of Bentley applications for the planning, design and construction phases such as WaterGEMS, Bentley Map, MicroStation, Bentley Navigator, Bentley Rail Track, OpenRoads, ProjectWise and STAAD.
The deployment of ProjectWise has helped solve the challenges related to collaboration and engineering content management with a team of in-house engineers located in seven offices across four continents. The product ensures that the information is accessible and, through defined workflows and rules, managed through the various phases to enable AECOM to meet project deadlines.
The company also used Bentley Map and WaterGEMS and saved over $90 million through water balancing with recycled water being utilised for industries and other non-potable uses. Besides, the use of Storm CAD saved an additional $45 million by designing an open channel that would not only collect, but also harvest and allow the reuse of storm water to enhance the quality of life within the city.
NJS Engineers India Private Limited
JICA-assisted Ganga Action Plan II Project, Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh
The objective of the Ganga Action Plan, Phase II, under the National Ganga River Basin Authority, is to improve water quality and river ecology as well as stop the of pollution of the Ganga/ Varuna river, tackle non-point sources of pollution, strengthen institutions, undertake capacity building, etc. The project has three components – sewerage, non-sewerage and institution development, and NJS Engineers India is the project management consultant.
Ganga, recently declared the national river of India, spans a length of 2,525 km. However, the United Nations has also declared it to be one of the world’s fastest shrinking and most endangered rivers. It is highly polluted by sewage and chemical waste and the Kanpur-Varanasi stretch is regarded as the most polluted stretch along the river. The present sewage generation in Varanasi city is about 300 million litres per day (mld), while the treatment capacity is 102 mld. Therefore, about 67 per cent of untreated sewage is discharged into the Ganga river, either directly or indirectly through the Varuna river.
NJS Engineers India has developed a rehabilitation and improvement plan, and has undertaken a review of the design, and the supervision of construction and operation planning. The company used Bentley’s solutions for the geographic information system (GIS) database update, sewerage zone development, sewerage network update, wastewater asset inventory, and existing and proposed system modelling. The solutions have helped the company save Rs 5 million during the design stage and Rs 10 million during the construction stage.
The SewerGEMS technology has been instrumental in the analysis of the 800 km sewer network. The solution streamlines the modelling process, so that there is more time to resolve wastewater engineering problems, such as improving capacity and limiting sewer overflows, which ultimately enable utilities to comply with sewer regulations set by regulatory agencies.
GE India Industrial Private Limited
RO#3 and ZLD system, Tuticorin, Tamil Nadu
GE India Industrial Private Limited is designing and installing a RO and ZLD system to treat contaminated water from a sulphuric acid plant located in Tuticorin, operated by Sterlite Copper. The $4.4 billion system with a processing capacity of 1,500 cubic metres per day is expected to treat contaminated water for reuse by the plant.
The company used Bentley’s PlantSpace to model the project components and pipe layout in 3D for visualisation and optimisation, and to replace the outdated 2D drawings. The Bentley PlantSpace design series provides a full range of intelligent 3D modelling applications for the engineering and design of process plants and discrete manufacturing industries. The design and analysis of the steel structures and pipe rack was performed using STAAD.Pro, which allows structural engineers to analyse and design virtually any type of structure through its flexible modelling environment, advanced features and fluent data collaboration. Flexible modelling is provided by a state-of-the-art graphical environment and the design supports over 80 international codes. The use of these software solutions helped GE India reduce the design phase by 20 days and save $26,800.
As countries worldwide have laid out ambitious plans for infrastructure development, they face the immense challenge of bringing in efficiency and reducing costs. In this context, there is both a need and great potential for deploying smart technology solutions.
