Fiber Optic Perimeter Security in Hidalgo: Refinery and Pipeline Perimeter Security in Hidalgo

FortSense® protects the Tula refinery, anti-huachicoleo pipelines and the Pachuca mining industrial corridor in Hidalgo with fiber optics.

Hidalgo's economy is anchored by the massive industrial and energy corridor of Tula de Allende, one of the most concentrated heavy infrastructure poles in central Mexico. The PEMEX Miguel Hidalgo Refinery, located just 80 kilometers north of Mexico City, has a processing capacity of approximately 315,000 barrels per day — the country's second largest of the six operating refineries — and is absolutely critical for the gasoline, diesel, jet fuel and fuel oil supply of the entire Valle de México Metropolitan Area with more than 21 million inhabitants.

The Francisco Pérez Ríos Thermoelectric Power Plant (also known as Tula I and II), operated by CFE with 1,500 MW of installed capacity on fuel oil and gas units, complements this energy pole, making Tula one of the country's most important strategic infrastructure nodes. The cement plants of Holcim México (formerly Apasco) and Cooperativa La Cruz Azul — one of Mexico's most iconic cement brands, founded in 1881 — add heavy industrial capacity to the corridor, along with Cal Química Mexicana and other construction materials companies.

The Pachuca-Real del Monte Mining District has a rich heritage as one of the world's leading silver producers during the colonial era and through the early twentieth century. The Compañía Real del Monte y Pachuca, founded with British investment in 1824, exploited deposits that produced hundreds of millions of ounces of silver. While large-scale mining has declined, active operations by companies such as Endeavour Silver and Minera Autlán (Mexico's leading manganese and ferroalloy producer) continue extracting silver, gold and industrial minerals.

The Hidalgo Logistics Platform (PLH) in Tepeapulco, developed as an intermodal distribution center with rail and road access, and the Sahagún Industrial Park in Ciudad Sahagún — with the industrial legacy of DINA (trucks and buses), Bombardier (metro railcars) and Siderúrgica Nacional — complement the manufacturing base. Proximity to Mexico City (1–2 hours by highway) makes the state a growing logistics center, with the Tizayuca Industrial Park and the Tula-Tepeji Industrial Corridor attracting distribution companies seeking lower costs than in CDMX.

Agroindustry is significant in the Huasteca Hidalguense region (coffee, sugar cane, citrus) and the Valle del Mezquital (home to Mexico's largest irrigation project using treated wastewater from Mexico City). Hidalgo is also an important producer of brewing barley for Grupo Modelo and Heineken México, and its textile industry in Tulancingo and Tepeji del Río employs thousands of workers in synthetic fiber and apparel factories.

The most urgent and tragic security challenge in Hidalgo is huachicoleo. The Tlahuelilpan explosion on January 18, 2019, where 137 people died burned alive trying to collect fuel from an illegally perforated 14-inch PEMEX pipeline, was one of Mexico's worst industrial tragedies in decades and exposed the industrial scale of fuel theft in the Tula-Pachuca corridor. Organized crime networks operate sophisticated pipeline perforation operations using specialized tools, valve assemblies and hoses, with clandestine tanker trucks transporting stolen fuel to illegal filling stations and distributors.

In the Tula Refinery corridor alone, hundreds of clandestine taps have been detected in recent years, each representing a potential catastrophic explosion risk in densely populated areas. Cargo theft on the México-Pachuca and México-Tuxpan highways connecting the capital to the Gulf coast, theft of minerals and metal concentrates, extortion of businesses and merchants, illegal mining in thousands of abandoned historic shafts of the Pachuca-Real del Monte District, and environmental contamination from illegal discharges in the Valle del Mezquital add further threat layers.

The climate varies significantly from temperate in the central valleys (Pachuca at 2,400 meters altitude) to semi-arid in the Valle del Mezquital and subtropical in the Huasteca. Frequent frosts at higher elevations between November and February, flash floods in low-lying industrial zones of Tula during summer storms, severe hailstorms damaging exposed infrastructure, and serious air quality problems generated by the combined emissions of the refinery, thermoelectric plant and Tula cement plants — forming one of Mexico's most air-polluted zones according to UNAM studies — affect industrial operations and the health of surrounding populations.

FortSense is the quintessential anti-huachicoleo technology, with vital relevance in Hidalgo where clandestine taps caused the worst pipeline explosion in Mexico's history. Fiber optics detect the specific vibration signatures of pipeline drilling in real time — the distinctive sound of drills and cutters penetrating the pipe wall — pinpointing the exact location of the threat with metric precision along kilometers of pipeline, enabling immediate response by security teams before the perforation is complete. This capability is literally life-saving in the Tula-Tlahuelilpan corridor.

Deployments include linear protection of PEMEX pipelines along tens of kilometers, the Miguel Hidalgo Refinery perimeter, the Francisco Pérez Ríos Thermoelectric Plant, the Tula-Tepeji and Sahagún industrial corridors, and the Hidalgo Logistics Platform.

Professional perimeter protection for distribution centers, manufacturing, and critical infrastructure in Hidalgo.