The Promise and Challenges of Digital Oilfield Solutions—Lessons Learned From Global Implementations and Future Directions

摘要

Digital Oil Field (DOF) in the oil and gas industry has gained momentum in the last few years and has transformed from being a vision to projects that have measurable value. The promise of DOF has motivated many oil and gas operators and service companies to now establish corporate initiatives and associated business programs to develop and deploy DOF solutions. Many major capital projects are already evaluating the feasibility of DOF in early stages of the project decision process as part of the operational philosophy. However, the implementation of these projects over the last few years has unraveled a multitude of practical challenges and hurdles to achieve the DOF goals, including selecting the candidate of highest value opportunities in the business unit's portfolio, justifying a business case, establishing new management processes to address operational transformation, defining people roles and responsibilities in DOF work processes, forming a team of skilled personnel for development and support of installed solutions, recognizing fit-for-purpose models, identifying appropriate technologies for the rapid deployment of integrated workflows, lack of open architecture and standards, project management approach, and change management, among others. This paper describes the challenges faced in DOF implementations by Halliburton and the current industry status. The case studies presented highlight these issues and practical lessons learned about addressing these issues using novel solutions and delivering value through adopting best practices. The paper also provides an insight into future trends and areas of development, addressing areas of challenges that still must be resolved.