Case Study
Digital twin of a petroleum tank farm for construction oversight
Scanned
12 ha
flights
163
to completion
1 year
2 weeks
spent on average on making a digital twin
Customer
Gazpromneft-Terminal, a subsidiary of Gazprom Neft, handles transportation and storage of petroleum products.
Problem
In 2021, Gazpromneft-Terminal started renovating a petroleum tank farm in Siberia. The company did not have a ready BIM model of the site to make a digital twin, and the tight timeline left no time to develop one. Gazpromneft-Terminal came to us with this problem.
Solution
We made a digital twin based on the point cloud, design documentation, and construction schedule. As a result, we got a virtual copy of the site that not only reflects the petroleum tank farm condition before renovation, but also contains information on the construction plans.
Consolidated the laser scanning data received from the customer into a single point cloud and linked it to the global coordinate system
Cut the cloud and removed noise and objects accidentally caught in frame: people, birds, equipment
Converted the cloud from .ptx to .e57 and uploaded it to the construction oversight system used by Gazpromneft-Terminal
Used the directory of standard elements and the directory of the site’s buildings and structures to build its structural model, a hierarchical list of the petroleum tank’s elements: engineering structures, utilities, tanks, pipelines, etc.
Developed a visual model of the petroleum tank farm based on the point cloud, site plan, satellite images, and 360° panoramic shots of the site
Delineated the visual model by connecting its elements to those of the structural model, for users to be able to interact with each element of the petroleum tank farm separately
Imported the construction schedule for renovation from MS Project to the oversight system, supplemented it with a cost estimate from Grand-Smeta, and linked the works in the construction schedule to the structural model elements
Connected the structural model elements to the corresponding sections of the design documentation in Gazpromneft-Terminal's electronic workflow system
What we did
Vladimir Kaydalov
Vice President of construction dept,
Gazprom Neft
Gazprom Neft
"We appreciate our cooperation because of the company’s highly qualified employees and responsibility. The product developed by Rubius will optimize the financial and time risks of our construction projects."
Saved resources
A point-cloud-based digital twin is
4
times cheaper
than its BIM-based counterpart
Reded financial and time costs
The costs for personnel business trips were reduced by
50%
80%
,
and the time
spent on business trips
decreased by
Quick start
Developing the digital twin took
6
days
instead of the
usual 14
Saved on labor
The surveyors saved
40%
of their time
on measuring
the territory
and
calculating the coordinates by
taking
measurements through
the program
Results
© NovoBIM, 2023