Open Industrial Interoperability Ecosystem (OIIE) and ISO 18101

Australia has historically been a consumer of international Standards and encounters problems gaining business value from standards that did not address Australian requirements. This project provides Australian organisations with a vehicle to participate in the development and use of emerging interoperability standards which are critical to the future productivity of the mining and energy resources sectors.

Interoperability is the ability of two or more supplier neutral components or systems to exchange information and to use the information that has been exchanged. This is a critical requirement in the age of digital technologies, where energy resources companies are increasingly investing in automation, integration, and digitisation initiatives. However, due to a lack of alignment throughout industry, where different systems from different vendors do not integrate at all, it has been challenging to achieve and this is a major barrier to deriving business value from digital transformation efforts.

Additionally, the integration of systems has been a time-consuming and expensive process, both from a delivery and maintenance perspective. Widespread interoperability across varying systems can only be achieved through reliance upon standard technology interfaces that establish clear rules for communicating.

NERA sees this as a significant opportunity to enable Australian input to the development of emerging global Standards that will support the continued drive for productivity, digital transformation and interoperability in the energy and broader resources sectors.

The primary objectives of the program are:

• the development of supplier-neutral global standards for oil and gas interoperability with input from Australian SMEs, operators, and academia;
• to provide Australian Energy Resources Sector participants with a consistent Open Industrial Interoperability Ecosystem (OIIE) framework for digital transformation and interoperability; and
• to develop the OIIE in cooperation with multiple industry standards associations as the basis for future parts of ISO TS 18101, providing interoperability specifications for both the energy sector and other asset intensive industries.

This program allows Australian businesses to participate in the development of global standards for interoperability that will support the continued drive for productivity and efficiency across the energy resources sector. It will also reposition Australia from being a consumer of standards to having the ability to contribute and influence the direction of critically important standards with global reach and impact.

The program also looks to:

• Boost skills and R&D: The OIIE will help industry participants connect with and use university-based research centres offering OIIE-enabled technical and business services such as advanced analytics in addition to more traditional professional skills development.
• Unlock value with interoperable digital technologies and reduce maintenance and inventory costs through reliable predictions of equipment failure.

The potential benefits span multiple categories of participants, in particular national and regional players who are no longer at the whim of globally dominant IT suppliers, including:

• Owner/Operators who have the ability to choose more flexibly from software offerings and hardware offerings with vendor neutral operating capabilities.
• SME software vendors since they can participate in an ecosystem with open and generally agreed interoperability standards.
• SME hardware vendors since the operation, parameterisation, maintenance data exchange and production data exchange can be geared towards a set of agreed standards instead of having to fit every possible vendor combination.
• Service providers who can mix and match offerings to efficiently produce solutions.

Additionally, the program supports NERA’s National Hydrogen Technology Cluster program members to gain business value by using interoperable standards developed via the OIIE OGI Pilot Program.

OIIE OGI Pilot Phase 3.2 Project Funding

The OIIE Oil and Gas Interoperability Pilot is broken into individual projects for phases addressing sets of industry requirements. The projects are part of the overall OIIE Program for interoperability and digital transformation. The costs below are for Phase 3.2 of the OIIE OGI Pilot. Future projects are planned to continue to develop and validate the OIIE to address Australian industry requirements before being published as future parts of ISO 18101.