Nexen’s Buzzard offshore complex is a system of three oil platforms anchored in the cold and choppy Atlantic some 62 miles northwest of Aberdeen, Scotland. Nexen, a Canadian energy company, designed the platforms to produce 200,000 barrels of oil per day, making the field one of the largest in the North Sea. But several years ago, one of Nexen’s three main power turbines generating Buzzard's electricity experienced a series of “trips” – or power fluctuations that result in a turbine shutdown, putting production in jeopardy.
Nexen, however, had equipped its turbines with GE's remote diagnostics software. A GE services team sitting 500 miles away quickly found the cause of the shutdowns and prevented severe equipment damage costing Nexen more that $10 million per day in lost oil output.
Remote Control: GE's Industrial Internet diagnostics system helped fix Buzzard's power turbine from 500 miles away.
The Buzzard turbines were monitored GE’s System 1 diagnostics software. The technology is part of GE’s Industrial Internet services solutions connecting people, data and machines. The software quickly gathered information from sensors inside the affected turbine and fed it for analysis to GE’s remote diagnostics centers in Aberdeen and the Netherlands. When GE service engineers went over the results, they noticed that some of the bearings sensors were reporting changes in temperature and voltage, tell-tale signs of bearing damage. A deeper analysis indicated that the control system in a lubricating pump was the likely culprit – a discovery that would not have been made until much later, or perhaps not at all, without accurate data about the exact time the incident occurred.
Acting on GE’s findings, Nexen fixed the bearing and corrected the pump's control system, solving the problem and averting potential damage and downtime. GE and Nexen estimate the System 1 technology has saved the energy company millions over the life of their service contract by detecting faults outside planned maintenance schedules, avoiding lost production, and mobilizing personnel and back-up equipment during outages. After GE helped fix the broken bearing, Nexen reviewed all of its rotating machinery to prevent similar accidents. The software has been monitoring machine vibrations, temperature, performance and emissions for machines ranging from gas turbines, compressors, pumps, fans and heat exchangers.
"Intelligent" service solutions like System 1 make good business sense. A new report from GE on the Industrial Internet estimates that by reducing capital expenditures by just 1 percent in the oil and gas sector, Industrial Internet systems and services could save the industry $90 billion over the next 15 years.
Last October, Michael Idelchik, vice president for advanced technologies at GE Global Research, pointed to 3-D printing called it “the next manufacturing revolution.” Idelchik said that 3-D printing, also described as additive manufacturing, “had the potential to fundamentally disrupt” how we make complex machines and transform industries. “The potential impact of additive manufacturing is huge,” Idelchik said. The technology “prints” intricate designs by adding thin layers of material on top of each other. “Four decades from now, we could be printing an entire engine this way,” says Michael Idelchik.
Beyond Testing: 3-D printers can manufacture parts from plastics and metals, just like these printed test samples of aircraft parts.
A full engine is still a tall order but printed jet engine parts are already here. The newest GE jet engines like the CFM LEAP, which GE Aviation makes in a joint venture with France’s Snecma, will have printed combustion system components and other parts inside.
This is only the beginning. GE Aviation just announced that it acquired two U.S. additive manufacturers who have developed advanced technologies for rapid 3-D prototyping and production. “Morris Technologies and Rapid Quality Manufacturing are parts of our investment in emerging manufacturing technologies,” said Colleen Athans, vice president and general manager of GE Aviation’s supply chain division. “Our ability to develop state of the art manufacturing processes for emerging materials and complex design geometry is critical to our future. We are so fortunate to have Morris Technologies and Rapid Quality Manufacturing just minutes from our headquarters. We know them well.”
Both companies are located in Cincinnati, close to GE Aviation’s plants. Morris Technologies and Rapid Quality Manufacturing operate 21 additive manufacturing machines. This makes them possibly the largest additive manufacturers in the world. The companies have been making prototype components for GE jet engines for several years. They have also made parts for GE Global Research and GE Power System. The price of the acquisitions has not been disclosed. Tag: GE Aviation, GE Global Research
Making people healthier does not always involve developing a more potent pill or building a better body imaging machine. Sometimes it pays to keep your eyes open and listen. A few years ago a group of care delivery professionals from GE Healthcare noticed that some hospitals were getting much better results than others. “Their ideas were new and innovative, but they were also incremental and did not turn the facility upside down,” says Denise Kruzikas, a healthymagination director at GE Healthcare. “They made care smoother, faster, and more efficient.”
What were these hospitals doing right and could it serve as a “best practice” for others? “We started looking for the true pioneers,” Kruzikas says. GE’s first visit was to Saint Luke’s Neuroscience Institute in Kansas City, Missouri, a leading stroke treatment center. Doctors at Saint Luke’s, a long-time GE customer, were using GE imaging technology to diagnose stroke patients. They were getting better results than others and the GE team wanted to know why.
Typically, no more than 5 percent of stroke patients receive “interventional treatment,” where doctors remove the blood clot in the brain that blocked an artery. This is because patients were not diagnosed properly or did not arrive at the hospital in time. However, Saint Luke’s developed an innovative stroke treatment protocol and increased this number to 40 percent, say Dr. Marilyn Rymer, medical director at the Neuroscience Institute. When stroke patients leave her hospital, they are doing better, have lower stroke severity scores, and stand a better chance to resume their lives. “Saint Luke’s combines education, outreach, and coordination with efficient care,” Kruzikas says. “They’ve got people, process and technology working together.”
Starting in 2005, Dr. Rymer’s team turned stroke treatment at the hospital into a series of interconnected steps, each with a measurable outcome. The steps ranged from teaching regional hospitals and EMT personnel to recognize stroke, performing a CT scan on suspected stroke patients to help inform treatment, and also starting physical, occupational and speech therapy a lot sooner to speed up the recovery and the quality of life. “It is critical for us to be as fast as we can at all times,” says Bridget Brion, a “Code Neuro” nurse at Saint Luke’s intensive care unit. “Every minute of a stroke one million brain cells die.” “Code Neuro” ICU nurses like Brion work directly with emergency room staff to care for a stroke patient. “Instead of having the emergency room acting as an independent silo taking care of stroke, we have a continuity of care that starts immediately when a stroke patient arrives until they go home,” Dr. Rymer says.
The GE team came in 2009 and took a “full download” of Saint Luke’s stroke data since the beginning of the new program. The researchers looked at patient volumes and outcomes, stroke education, time to diagnosis and treatment, length of stay, and costs.
The analysis showed that between 2005 and 2010, the hospital increased the amount of stroke patients by 23 percent and boosted transfers by 17 percent. Around 40 percent of stroke patients at Saint Luke’s receive interventional stroke treatment such as clot-dissolving medication deployed directly at the site of a blood clot in the brain. The average across the healthcare system is only 3 to 5 percent. Given the important stroke related information it provides in a relatively short time, nearly all stroke patients at Saint Luke’s receive a CT scan followed by specialized post-processing analysis. “The bottom line was that patients were doing better and they were able to get discharged earlier,” Kruzikas says.
Last June, Dr. Rymer traveled to GE’s training and education center in Crotonville, New York, and presented the results as “best practice” steps to stroke doctors from the U.S. and abroad. “Every hospital around the country should be stroke ready and stroke able,” Dr. Rymer says. “That just hasn’t happened.” Stroke is the leading cause of disability among adults in the U.S. Approximately 795,000 strokes occur in the U.S., costing $25 billion in 2007.
The Saint Luke’s study was part of GE’s healthymagination program, whose goals include finding innovative solutions to healthcare and improving access to treatment. The GE team is already seeking out facilities that excel in treating breast cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, and low-dose radiation management. “It’s about using what’s out there in a more efficient and productive way,” Kruzikas says. “We want to address our customer’s need and support best practice models that can be replicated around the world.”
When the U.S. Navy’s USS Makin Island leaves base, it does not steam across the ocean. It motors. The amphibious assault ship, commissioned in 2009, is the Navy’s first hybrid ship. “It’s like a floating Prius, but much bigger,” says Paul English, a marine leader in GE’s Power Conversion business. “If you consider a hybrid car, it makes sense to run the gas engine on the highway and switch to an electric motor in stop-and-go traffic. It’s the same on the ocean.”
In the Navy: Sailors and Marines with the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit scrub down the flight deck of the amphibious assault ship USS Makin Island. The ship is the Navy’s first vessel powered by hybrid propulsion.
GE gave the Makin Island a new system using a combination of two advanced gas turbines for high-speed sailing (they use the same jet engine technology that powers Air Force One and many Boeing 747 jumbos) and a pair of 10,000-horse-power electric motors that kick in when the vessel slows down below 12 knots. The motors draw power from six diesel generators. “Most ships spend the overwhelming majority of their working life doing something other than rushing from one place to another at top speed,” English says. “In fact, for about 70 percent of their operational life, ships tend to kind of hang around, deploy troops and aircraft, or support marines on the ground.”
English says that when a typical gas turbine falls well below maximum output, it becomes “tremendously inefficient, burning fuel just to turn over.” The GE propulsion system solves the problem and saves millions in fuel costs along the way. The Navy estimates that hybrid propulsion will save $250 million in fuel over the life of the ship. “If you work that up over a fleet of ships, you’ll see that something big is going on,” English says.
The 800-foot long USS Makin Island, which can carry close to 100 helicopters and 3,000 sailors and marines, saved the Navy more than 4 million gallons of fuel worth $15 million during its first 7-month deployment. GE has already received orders for two more hybrid ships, including one for the Navy’s latest large-deck amphibious assault ship, USS Tripoli, announced this week.
Says English: “It’s astonishing, it’s big time, it’s kind of catching on.”
Thousands of volunteers have fanned out this weekend across towns and neighborhoods still reeling from damage caused by Hurricane Sandy. In Brooklyn’s Red Hook, for example, New Yorkers and visitors hauled out debris from flooded basements and handed out blankets and warm clothes from church steps and garages. At shelters in Park Slope, locals were helping the ill and the elderly with basic human necessities such as using the bathroom and brushing the teeth. In Coney Island, teams of volunteers carried food and water to residents stranded in high rise buildings still without power. Sandy’s victims need all the help they can get. According to the latest estimates, more than 1.3 million homes and business along the East Coast are still without electricity.
GE and its employees have been helping out, too. GE Foundation gave $1 million to the American Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund and another $100,000 to the United Way of America for local community needs. The company will also match in full employee donations to the American Red Cross and other disaster relief organizations. GE volunteers have also reached out to local non-profits to help on the ground.
[slides image_align="left"] [image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Sandy-Brooklyn.jpg"] Friends in Need: Hundreds of volunteers traveled to Brooklyn’s Red Hook neighborhood to help clearing out flooded basements and handing out water, food, and warm clothing. [/image] [image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Sandy-Brooklyn2.jpg"] Friends in Need: Hundreds of volunteers traveled to Brooklyn’s Red Hook neighborhood to help clearing out flooded basements and handing out water, food, and warm clothing. [/image] [/slides]
“While state and local governments as well as relief organization are still in the middle of determining the exact needs as a result of Hurricane Sandy, we have employees, customers and neighbors who have lost or damaged homes, or who are still living without power,” said Bob Corcoran, vice president of GE Foundation. “Through our partner relief organizations, GE can help those in need in the aftermath and we will.”
In addition to the Sandy relief donations, the GE Foundation supports disaster relief through a $1 million grant to the American Red Cross Annual Disaster Giving Program. The money helps the Red Cross mount an immediate response to any disaster and help people who are affected by it. GE also helps local communities through more than $8 million in contributions to 500 United Way organizations throughout the United States and in other countries.
