Offshore Security

Security for the offshore oil and gas industry in the Nigeria region has been an issue for many years. Recent incidents offshore in certain parts of the world have emphasised the burgeoning risk of attacks by militants to oil facilities in deep water fields. To mitigate this risk it is essential to provide deep water facility managers with as much advanced warning as possible of any approaching threats, in order to safeguard installation personnel and allow for the safe and controlled shutdown of operations. Easat offers a comprehensive radar surveillance system which involves securing enhanced visibility of the maritime operating environment. This is to be achieved through the use of high-resolution radar, for the detection of small, fast-moving targets at long ranges, and high quality long-range thermal imaging and visual cameras for the subsequent identification of such targets. Modern advances in signal processing can greatly improve the radar performance in rain or in rough seas, i.e. in clutter; signal processing techniques can do little to improve clear weather radar performance. All such improvements can do is to reduce the degradation of radar performance due to clutter.

Offshore Security Solutions EA7401M Antenna EA3462 Antenna (click photo to enlarge)

The long-range EA3462 X-band radar has been assessed independently as capable of detecting small boats, with radar cross section (RCS) measuring only 1 sq m2 out to 14 nautical miles subject to the antenna height. Easat can carry out full computer analysis to accurately predict detection performance.

The Easat EA3462 radar antenna is designed to provide the most cost-effective solution for maritime and coastal surveillance. Based on industry standard architectures, the radar makes use of consolidated and proven Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) technologies to provide outstanding performance, simplified logistics and low cost of ownership.

The Easat long-range radar is of modular construction and concentrates most of the functional areas of the system into separate units. This approach, together with the extensive computer driven built-in test equipment (BITE), provides rapid and easy repair and maintenance of the system.

In view of the remoteness of offshore installations a considerable amount of redundancy through duplication of critical components can be included in the system.

The antenna turning unit has proven reliability and should provide over 20 years of service with minimal maintenance requirements.

The radar antenna (type EA3462) has very high gain and narrow beamwidth enabling very high probability of detection of small targets at long ranges. Performance in adverse weather conditions is enhanced through the use of (switchable) circular polarisation. For optimum performance, a similarly high quality radar processing system can be selected to meet the surveillance needs required for the offshore oil and gas industry. This is particularly important for successful detection and tracking of security threat targets, especially small high-speed boats.

Every antenna manufactured by Easat is sent to an RF testing facility totally independent of the Company to ensure that the RF characteristics required by the end user are fully compliant.

Dependent upon the customer requirements, Easat can include other security devices, typically, thermal cameras, to provide a multi-layer security system.