Monitoring liquid in remotely located storage tanks

Abstract An apparatus for monitoring fluid levels in a fuel storage tank comprising: at least one tank sensor providing information indicative of the amount of fluid in the storage tank; at least one monitoring unit associated with each storage tank, said monitoring unit communicatively linked with at least one tank sensor so that information measured by the tank sensor is communicated to the monitoring unit and also communicatively linked with a temperature sensor that provides temperature information indicative of the ambient temperature at the storage tank location; said monitoring unit including a processor to receive and process the communicated tank sensor information and a memory to store processed tank sensor information, wherein said monitoring unit processor also receives and processes the communicated temperature information and said memory stores processed temperature information and wherein said processor is programmed to: use stored fluid level information to determine historical fuel usage for each tank; use said temperature information to calculate the number of elapsed Degree-Days for each tank location; use historical fuel usage and Degree-Day values to calculate a predicted fluid level for each storage tank; and compare the predicted fluid level to the actual fluid level determined from fluid level information received from said fluid sensor to determine whether a predefined out-of-ordinary event has occurred. 3786757_1 (GHMatters) P74287.AU.119110/2012 IN k I V- .