Managing Information Resource: A Key to Synergy in Petroleum Exploration and Production: ABSTRACT

Abstract

Information resource in petroleum exploration and production (E P) has generally been managed poorly because of technical and human/organizational problems. In the past, E P companies could afford not to exploit the potential of their data/information resource fully because they could hope for continuing discoveries of big fields and profitable exploitation once hydrocarbon was found. As large and easy-to-find hydrocarbon fields have almost been discovered, the E P industry is facing a new reality-the need to find and develop hydrocarbon fields from geologically complex and/or hitherto inaccessible areas and enhance recovery from existing fields faster and at lower costs. In such a competitive business environment, an E P company is required to manage its activities through a synergistic approach to carry out integrated interpretation for timely decision making. The success of the synergistic approach depends mainly on the exploitation of information resource through integration of often disparate data, old and new, from diverse E P disciplines.