Sharing petroleum data through Diskos for 20 years

03/09/2015 This year is the 20th anniversary since the joint database Diskos was created. The base has been and continues to play an important role for the companies on the shelf for access to seismic, well and production data.

"The Diskos database is a success because it provides companies and the authorities very good access to quality-assured data from the Norwegian shelf. This is also a competitive advantage in the international market," comments Maria Juul, assistant director of data and document management at the NPD.

The idea behind Diskos was that oil companies would collaborate on storage of geological raw data and compete on its interpretation. The database was originally created and designed by the NPD and the oil companies Statoil, Norsk Hydro, and Saga Petroleum. Later, virtually all oil companies represented on the Norwegian shelf joined, in addition to parts of the supplier industry. Norwegian universities have free access to the database for research and teaching.

Modern exploration involves collecting and processing vast amounts of data, while the logistics of traditional data storage "before Diskos" was both inefficient and expensive. In the 20 years that Diskos has been operating, the system has shown that it can handle large amounts of data very efficiently. This includes most of the digital seismic data and well data from the Norwegian shelf.

The NPD and oil companies set high data quality standards that must be met for everything that is stored in the database, so that users trust Diskos. One of the cornerstones of the system is the use of quality-assured key data from NPD's fact pages with overviews of e.g. licences, companies, wells, and seismic surveys.

Reporting and data management are based on international data transfer and storage standards.

End users can download the data directly to their workstations via high-speed lines at a low cost. The system is well adapted for the sale and exchange of data. For the NPD, Diskos is an outstanding tool for efficient disclosure of data.

NPD’s adjusted reporting procedures (2012) require systems to be able to handle much larger volumes of data than previously, which the current contract is focused on. Diskos is operated today by the CGG and Kadme companies.

Updated: 03/09/2015

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