Gary, Anthony1, William E Full2, Garry Jones3
(1) Tramontane, Inc, Salt Lake City, UT
(2) Advanced Solutions Group, Univ. of South Carolina, Columbia, SC
(3) Unocal Corp, Sugar Land, TX
ABSTRACT: Biostratigraphy Web Portal: Giving the Petroleum Geoscientist Access to Key Data
Historically, petroleum companies maintained large staffs of specialists (e.g.,
geochemists, sedimentologists, biostratigraphers) to collect, maintain, interpret and
distribute key data to geoscientists. Over the past couple decades, the amount of geologic
data has dramatically increased while the numbers of specialists available to manage it
have decreased. It is therefore a considerable challenge to create tangible value from
data in the specialists’ domain.
Specialists’ data must be vetted of errors and sometimes require various transforms
and fixes. In addition, someone must cast the data into a structure that is understandable
by the non-specialist. Geoscientists in some companies still face data access problems
both in terms of content, timeliness of delivery, or both. The worst case is that data are
simply not used.
Unocal Corporation has addressed these problems for their biostratigraphic and log-derived
sand count data by developing a database and web-enabled portal that allows direct access
to these data. The portal has a variety of queries, analyses, and displays that are
designed to meet the specific needs of petroleum geoscientists. The underlying
architecture is based on a combination of database management software in conjunction with
JAVA programming. A key to successful development has been to allow the user community to
be the primary driver and not the IT community. Other keys to the success of the portal
are the GIS, Graphic visualization and report functions.
AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90026©2004 AAPG Annual Meeting, Dallas, Texas, April 18-21, 2004.