CLIENT
Nutrien Ag Solutions

OBJECTIVE
Create a digital twin for hands-on training required to safely transfer ammonia from a transport vehicle to a storage vessel.

APPROACH
Nutrien’s complex process of transferring the hazardous ammonia safely consists of 60+ steps. We needed our solution to function as an exact virtual replica of Nutrien’s real site, so we created a digital twin of their site in which users can fully interact with all pipes, valves, buttons, etc. exactly as they would in real life. 

The Problem – High Risk, Hazardous environment and process

The Nutrien Ammonia transfer is a complex and highly specific procedure involving over 60 steps from the putting on the correct PPE, preparing the site, connecting equipment, transfer, disconnection, correctly exiting the site, etc. Almost all these steps require precision and adherence to strict safety protocols.

The process is not only difficult to memorize due to its length and complexity, but any deviation from the standard procedure can have severe consequences. Ammonia is a dangerous chemical that poses significant risks to both the environment and human health, meaning even a small mistake, such as incorrect valve operation or mismanagement of pressure systems, can lead to hazardous leaks, chemical burns, or even catastrophic explosions. This complexity makes traditional training methods insufficient, as they rely heavily on memorization, leaving room for human error in high-stress, real-world situations.

Nutrien needed a solution to reduce the odds of a safety hazard and to keep their engineers and our environment safe, they needed to  train engineers without placing them into a highly dangerous environment, and without the need of incredibly expensive physical dummy equipment. But how can they learn to use equipment and complete the lengthy physical process without being able to train with the actual equipment?

THE SOLUTION – Vr Digital twin FOR high-risk ammonia transfer training

Virtual reality for high risk training is an incredible way to mitigate risks in hazardous environments and eliminate the dangers inexperienced employees may face when training for a new role. Shiift decided to harness the amazing power of virtual reality and created a digital twin of their site and equipment, where users could enter the site and interact with every inch of it within a VR headset or via the web application.

Instantly, thousands of users can access the digital twin at once and complete the full 60+ step process as many times as they need to without any additional cost after initial deployment. VR users can train their muscle memory with the physical equipment, and do the same process on Nutrien’s LMS with mouse and keyboard controls if they prefer. The system tracks all user’s interactions with equipment and submits data to Nutrien’s LMS directly so that users may be assessed on how they understand the process.

• Working closely with Nutrien to create a high-quality immersive VR interactive program for ammonia training.
• Educates employees in a safe hands-on, controlled environment on the correct decision-making choices in real world scenarios for ammonia handling.
• Reporting dashboard for trainers demonstrates how the trainee has completed the tasks and captures key data throughout.

Interesting and Unique Features 

1. Digital Twin: The application is a complete digital twin of all the parts Nutrien’s engineers would need to work with on their site when transferring ammonia.
2. Fully interactive: The product allows users to interact with all parts of the virtual equipment and vehicles, allowing them to turn valves, connect objects, press buttons, turn levers, etc. All steps can be done in or out of order depending on the mode chosen, essentially making it akin to a sandbox gaming environment where users have a high degree of freedom being able to interact with objects in any order they wish, and experiencing hazards virtually if they do things wrong.
3. LMS Integration: The web version of this software is accessible directly from Nutrien’s existing LMS, so users can easily login to their LMS where they access all their training, and admins can view data regarding the application in the same place as the rest of their learner data would be.
4. Training, Practice & Assessment modes: The application comes with 3 modes; The training mode where users are limited to certain actions in a specific order and follow a live walk through with voiced instructions and visual guides; The practice mode, where users can practice the process with a high degree of freedom being able to interact with any object in any order, and witnessing a hazard if they do something wrong, or request a hint that will pop-up a voice-over and dialog text-box and other visual elements to aid the user for that step. Ending the mode allows users to see how they did; and the assessment mode, which is similar to practice mode but offers zero hints, and tracks all data on which steps were passed or failed depending on the correct order or method. This gets displayed on a scoreboard for the user and is also tracked with Nutrien’s LMS.