Assessment of Malaysian Active GPS Station (MASS) Data for Deformation Analysis of an Oil Platform

Currently, Global Positioning System (GPS) is becoming more popular technique in
surveying and other applications in Civil Engineering. The Project undertaken for the
Final Year Project "Assessment of Malaysian Active GPS Station (MASS) Data for
Deformation Analysis of an Oil Platform" is basically an analysis of the deformation for
an oil platform using MASS as the reference stations for Global Positioning System
(GPS) technique. The study is to compare the accuracy of using Malaysian Active GPS
System (MASS) stations and other conventional reference stations for the deformation
analysis of the oil platform. Deformation of an engineering structure is often measured in
order to ensure that the structure is exhibiting safe deformation behavior. The availability
of free GPSdata fromMASSstation couldpromotethe use of GlobalPositioning System
(GPS) technique for application relevant in Civil engineering such as deformation
monitoring for high rise structure, bridge, oil platformand dam, at a reduced cost. One of
the PETRONAS Oil Platform, Pulai which is currently undergoing subsidence has been
chosen for the analyses. Three field points in the platform, three conventional reference
stations in the onshore and four MASS stations have been analyzed. The analysis has
been done by using relevant GPS software which is GeoGenius. The accuracy using GPS
data from conventional reference stations and MASS stations are almost the same. In
future, existing MASS stations can be used as the reference stations instead of setting up
new reference stations for GPS deformation analysis of any engineering structures at a
reduced cost.