Critical Surveillance for Australia's Oil and Gas Facilities

Synectics’ integration partner Western Advance has been commissioned to design and upgrade new surveillance solutions for 13 facilities across Australia – with Synergy and COEX cameras at their core.

Australia’s largest Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) producers with multiple offshore condensate and gas extraction facilities, and multiple onshore LNG processing facilities providing over 5% of global LNG supply. One with the largest Floating Liquified Natural Gas (FLNG) facilities built, and one of the world’s largest natural gas developments. An impressive role call that all have one thing in common.

They’ve all gone through a phased strategic campaign to upgrade their facilities with the latest digital CCTV infrastructure, replacing their existing surveillance solutions with Synectics’ industry-leading command and control platform.

They are also all beneficiaries of Synectics’ long-standing partnership with Western Advance, Australia’s specialist in designing, engineering, commissioning, and installing electronic security, surveillance and threat detection solutions.

Supporting evolving needs with Synergy

Synectics' partnership with Western Advance has spanned over ten years and began in 2010 with work on the Gorgon Project. Western Advance specified an integrated, end-to-end surveillance solution with Synectics’ Synergy command and control software platform at its core. Also incorporating over 230 COEX camera stations, including hazardous and safe-area TriMode PTZs, the solution delivered complete situational awareness.

In 2021, Western Advance completed a full Synergy upgrade to meet Gorgon’s evolving needs, including the deployment of Synectics’ latest network-attached storage system for delivering real-time, high-quality recording of IP and analogue video streams from Synectics’ COEX and third-party cameras.

Gorgon is not alone in its decision to stay with Synectics. In the last twelve months, Western Advance has also upgraded the existing Synergy solutions for an FLNG facility that produces around 5.3 million tonnes per annum and other offshore production facilities responsible for providing much of the domestic gas for Western Australia.

“The latest version of Synergy has a lot to endear it to major oil and gas operators,” said Chris Ball, General Manager – West for Western Advance, “not least its operating structure and built-in cyber measures which together offer the consistency and robust security increasingly demanded by developments moving to a single IP infrastructure for all systems.

“Better still, the way Synergy is designed and the way Synectics work means the installation and commissioning process is simplified. Synectics engineers are always there if we need support, but they don’t have to fly out, or answer calls all the time, because the technology enables us to ‘do what we do’ and do it well.”

Testbed for digital transformation leads to widespread rollout

Western Advance has also been working on a major transformation project for a company responsible for around 5% of global LNG supply.

Having won a successful bid to install Synergy at a single site, Synergy is now being installed across the customer’s network in Western Australia as part of the company’s digital strategy. This includes ensuring that all sites can be monitored and managed remotely from the company’s Perth-based HQ.

Chris said: “This is a big project to equip the customer’s onshore and offshore facilities with the tools they need to gradually migrate to being fully IP.

"In this region, we are really the only company with the engineering and solution knowledge necessary to undertake such a task and for us, Synergy is the ideal platform to be working with."
Chris Ball, General Manager – West, Western Advance

“Synergy’s architecture means the customer can leverage their existing analogue set-up while we help them steadily transition to new technologies. As well as a lot of work around their cabling infrastructure, particularly for offshore, our focus right now is on cameras. In fact, having already upgraded around 100 of their HQ cameras, the next stage of this project is to upgrade over 150 analogue cameras – spanning onshore and offshore facilities – with Synectics’ COEX hazardous-area IP cameras. A combination of fixed and PTZ C3000 standard and TriMode models.”

Protecting onshore wells from the word go

The ‘Synergy plus COEX cameras’ combination is also one that appealed to a new development on the Australian oil and gas scene – a vast LNG production facility that draws up from numerous onshore wells.

Chris added: “We’ve worked with the EPC contractor involved in this project for many years so when they were faced with a very specific set of requirements, they came to us for advice on architecture and design – a design leveraging Synergy.

“We’re also supplying COEX C3000 hazardous-area PTZs for process monitoring. The name ‘COEX’ really resonates with the oil and gas market here. And not just for its heritage. I think it’s also very much associated with pioneering technology. For instance, while this project isn’t utilising COEX 4K cameras, the fact that these cameras are out there helps to instil reassurance that this is a solutions provider committed to leading on new developments for the industry. In our world, being able to build trust in technology really matters.”

“The latest version of Synergy has a lot to endear it to major oil and gas operators.”

Chris Ball, General Manager – West, Western Advance