Telemetry in the world of gases started with diffusion in the late of 1990s. First installations were focused on the remote monitoring of liquid oxygen tanks in hospitals, then telemetry began to be extended to a few of industrial customers, and in particular to strategic customers with irregular and unpredictable consumptions.
Since 2000, gas companies have gradually begun to consider the remote monitoring of the cryogenic tanks not only as a strategic purpose for commercial activity, but mainly as a useful tool. Besides consolidating the partnership between supplier and customer, telemetry has indeed allowed for significant reduction of logistics costs. Wireless solutions and the next step in this reduction of costs for connectivity, through GPRS networks as well as the reduction of installation costs due to more vertical solutions available, are contributing to extend the telemetry wave.
According to the long experience of AMBRA Sistemi s.r.l., although the technological level is undoubtedly important, the choice of a telemetry system – mainly when intended for the control of cryogenic tanks – must, however, be based on two basic criteria that are apparently not so important and too often neglected. The main criterion concerns the simplicity of the installation; devices used for the first telemetry solutions consisted of a black box that collected many analogue and digital signals from sensors and transducers located in the same plant. Soon, however, we realised that the cost of installation and commissioning of such systems could easily become 3-5 times higher than the hardware costs.
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