On the face of it, fuel monitoring systems provide a valuable means of assisting maritime operators in checking and reducing their rates of fuel consumption, hopefully resulting in improved operational efficiency and lower overheads. While this simplistic description is correct, it neglects a rather complex set of related factors which can drastically affect the commercial opportunities available to operators, particularly those within the offshore sector. Obviously, slashing fuel consumption rates can save operators/owners significant amounts of money (in some cases, hundreds of thousands of dollars per year), but the benefits of adequate fuel monitoring extend beyond a quantifiable reduction in operational expenditure. Given the high volumes of fuel consumption by offshore vessels, any fuel price savings can have a considerable impact on day-to-day operational cost savings and efficiencies. However, any downward trend of oil prices means that there is inevitably less exploration and production (E&P) activity around to bid for, and any contracts that are awarded come with considerable requirements for operational cost reductions and controls. To meet these challenges, advanced fuel management systems are helping both operators and oil companies improve their management of oil field supply (OFS) fleets.
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