The Ultimate E&P Data Management Solution.

In today's fast changing world most oil companies are aware of the importance and value of their data.

Millions of dollars are spent in acquiring data, however the true return is only realised when the data is used.

PetroVision is the most adaptable solution in the E&P data management domain. Core standards protect you from investing in a proprietary solution and the PetroVision environment allows you to easily integrate the solution into your company specific flows and procedures.

By utilising the Petrotechnical Open Software Corporation (POSC) Epicentre data model and standards, Oracle data base software and adhering to industry standard formats for data storage, the PetroVision solution ensures that your data management investment is protected from obsolescence brought about by proprietary data management.

Below is a summary description of the PetroVision family of products and services. PetroVision is part of a large set of components of an Exploration and Production (E&P) databank environment.

This environment is made up of the following components:

1. A set of software products that provide data browsing, access and extract functionality for end user applications.

2. A set of software products that provide the management and control infrastructure of the E&P databank environment such as access authorisation, data security, data request queuing and servicing, and audit trail and log management.

3. A set of software products that support the data capture, data loading and ongoing physical data store management activities. The products that fall within this domain are:

• Bulk data stage posting, conditioning and loading software.
• Data capture work flow management and physical store management software.
• Tape library transcription software.
• Paper document scanning software.

4. A set of software products that provide a near line data store management environment, such as access to robotic data storage devices, which are integrated into the databank environment.

5. POSC Epicentre E&P Data Model implemented on Oracle Relational Database Management Software (RDBMS).

6. Baseline hardware and communication environment.

In addition to the above, GeoLeader provides a full range of complementary services such as integration of databank hardware and communication environments, data capture and data loading services such as cataloging, tape library transcription and paper document scanning, client-specific customisation of PetroVision software, facilities management and training. These services are described in more detail elsewhere.

The Choice of Data Model

In practice the choice of the datamodel defines the level of data integration, and hence the level of end-user sophistication that can be achieved in a databank environment.

PetroVision uses the POSC Epicentre datamodel. The reasons for this choice are highlighted below:

• The POSC Epicentre data model has the widest coverage of E&P data available.
• The POSC Epicentre data model is strongly supported by most of the major oil companies. And there is now no doubt that it will become the standard for the E&P industry after the announcement that the last big oil companies, which supported the PPDM data model until end 1996, have decided to support only the POSC Epicentre data model.
• Using the POSC Epicentre data model results in desirable side effects such as better resolution and definition of data. For example, not only does one need to define a Kelly Bushing elevation, but also the unit of measure, the coordinate system, reference elevation datum, etc.
• We are able to draw upon the experiences gained by the wider E&P community that is actively conducting or sponsoring projects in uses of Epicentre.
• Use of an application suite-related datamodel environment would have resulted in too much dependency on the application vendor, and a very limited scope of datamodel as these systems typically only model the data as utilised within the application.
• We believe that using the Epicentre as the target repository data model has resulted in many benefits for the project, and we will continue to accrue more benefits as time goes on.

Definition of a Databank

In simplistic terms, a databank is made up of the following components:

A well defined datamodel that covers most of the subjects and activities of an E&P company, and hence can act as a receptacle for all E&P related data. This is essentially the POSC Epicentre datamodel.

Methods of logically populating the databank with E&P data, specifically:

• Positional/cartographic/cultural data.
• Geophysical data (seismic, gravity, magnetics, etc.).
• Well-related data (header, logs, flow tests, cores, cuttings, etc.).
• Production data.
• Physical inventory data for document and digital data libraries.
• Project-related derived (interpreted) data.
• Methods of mapping data from existing data models or formats into the target databank domain.
• Methods of inputting, quality checking/conditioning, and processing various physical data types and formats for the purpose of legacy data loading.
• Transcription of seismic, navigation and well log tapes into a nearline (preferably robotic) environment.
• Automatic vectorisation of manually digitized data for the cases where a digital version does not exist, specifically for well logs, seismic sections, and positional information.
• Well defined workflow practices and methods of quality checking all input to the databank.
• Well defined output interfaces for ad hoc queries, date browsing, delivery and reformatting. Queries to be via a text interface as well as a GIS style interface.
• Links to E&P application/project environments where the datamodel of the application/project is different to that of the databank.
• Importing of existing data such as physical store indices, geographic data, etc.
• Scanning of paper data such as maps, seismic sections, well logs, exploration reports, etc.

A robust data management environment incorporating physical data security, access authorisation, tracking of check-in/check-out activities, disaster recovery and backup.

The computer and communication infrastructure to support the above activities.

Links to third-party application software

The PetroVision users are able to link their favourite E&P application suites to the databank environment. Applications immediately benefit from the ability of defining project areas on maps, extracting data to download to the specific application suites, using the databank environment for bulk archiving, retrieval and tracking of interpretation project status.

Remote access

PetroVision has a solution for remote access to Data Bank called PetroVision WEB

All requests and offers concerning PetroVision / PetroVision WEB send to