Application of Deep Learning for Predictive Maintenance of Oilfield Equipment

This thesis explored applications of the new emerging techniques of artificial intelligence and deep learning (neural networks in particular) for predictive maintenance, diagnostics and prognostics. Many neural architectures such as fully-connected, convolutional and recurrent neural networks were developed and tested on public datasets such as NASA C-MAPSS, Case Western Reserve University Bearings and FEMTO Bearings datasets to diagnose equipment health state and/or predict the remaining useful life (RUL) before breakdown. Many data processing and feature extraction procedures were used in combination with deep learning techniques such as dimensionality reduction (Principal Component Analysis) and signal processing (Fourier and Wavelet analyses) in order to create more meaningful and robust features to use as an input for neural networks architectures. This thesis also explored the potential use of these techniques in predictive maintenance within oil rigs for monitoring oilfield critical equipment in order to reduce unpredicted downtime and maintenance costs.