The Propipe North America team recently returned from the International Pipeline Conference & Expo (IPCE) in Calgary, where we had the opportunity to meet with pipeline professionals, demonstrate our technology and, most importantly, hear directly from the people working with pig tracking and pipeline integrity every day.
If you’re running a cleaning pig, batching pig, or inline inspection (ILI) tool, you need to know where it is throughout the run. Every checkpoint confirms the pig is moving as expected. Every missed detection creates uncertainty. In some cases, it can mean hours of additional field work, unnecessary excavation, or delays to the entire operation.
Pipeline pigging improves maintenance because it moves operators from reactive repairs to planned, data-driven upkeep. Cleaning runs protect the line, inspection runs find defects early, and a tracking system — transmitter, AGM, and software working together — makes the whole program verifiable. Every run confirmed, every passage timestamped, every dataset feeding the next maintenance decision.
Pipeline integrity management is often discussed in technical terms, but in reality, it comes down to one thing: having reliable data you can trust.
Pipeline operators face real-world challenges when performing pipeline pig tracking in the field. Connectivity issues, extra devices, and unstable links often slow down operations and introduce unnecessary complexity.
