The petrol pump is one of the next scenes for automation in India. In a move to curb fuel adulteration and to face the competition from the private sector, the state-owned oil marketing companies are implementing an end-to-end automation of the fuel delivery network.
印度石油公司有限公司（IOCL），Bharat Petroleum Corp. Ltd.（BPCL）和印度斯坦石油公司有限公司（HPCL）已经确定了将实施该项目的位置和汽油泵。
“Retail automation at petrol pumps is new, and we are looking at deploying these systems at 1,000 petrol pumps in 14 states by yearend,” says Vimal Kapoor, managing director, Honeywell Automation India Ltd. (HAIL), “Our major customers in this segment are the public sector HPCL and IOCL, who are deploying these systems at their outlets.”
锁定掺假者
A key facet of the technology-driven project, coming as it does after various measures dependent on manual intervention, is to introduce an electronic locking system for tanker-trucks transporting the fuel, and at select petrol pumps. Apart from making it more difficult for fuel adulterators, the companies are confident of offering improved customer service and enjoying greater control over the retail outlets.
According to a BPCL official, the electronic locking system on tanker-trucks and underground tanks would be linked to a central computer system. It would help the company monitor sales and stocks.
The automation covers various aspects of the outlets, including level gauges in underground tanks and gauges to check quality parameters of the fuel. Every time fuel is dispensed, a bill, giving details of the date, time, quantity of the purchase, the pump and the attendant who delivered the product, will be generated automatically.
泵的自动化将为石油公司提供准确的销售数据和控制任何掺假的数据，这可能发生在零售业。这些好处也将流向客户。
对于印度霍尼韦尔自动化，下一步是在车辆内引入车辆身份识别单元。这将使汽油泵可以通过无现金交易来识别车辆，将其填充并将金额添加到客户的信用卡中。该“单元”是在fob上的RFID芯片，在靠近泵时，或者客户向读者挥舞时，它正在读取。
“This will help fleet owners who are concerned over theft, besides being a convenience. The system will not allow a driver to divert fuel from the vehicle's fuel tank to a jerrycan, for instance,” Kapoor says.
临界质量
However, there is a catch: Honeywell needs critical mass before it can deploy these systems. “We need a large installed base; say 40 percent of all petrol pump population in a city like Mumbai would be enough. We expect this will happen by December ‘08,” Kapoor notes.
Meanwhile, IOCL is spending $364 million on automation over two years, covering more than 2,000 of its 16,000 retail outlets, in the initial phase, including those of IBP, IOCL’s Director, Marketing, G. C. Daga, said in a press statement.
自动化计划很可能与从仓库到零售店点的油轮的基于GPS的跟踪系统有关，也将有助于库存控制。全印度石油贸易商联合会副总裁M. Kannan希望该项目将带回转移忠诚度的客户。
关于作者
Uday Lal Pai, udaylalpai@gmail.com, is a freelance journalist based in India
