Oil and Gas use of AI Technology

Worked with this industry for a while. Here a good non-technical overview:

Oil & Gas Industry Transforming Itself with the Help of AI   By AI Trends Staff

The oil and gas industry is turning to AI to help cut operating costs, predict equipment failure, and increase oil and gas output.

A faulty well pump at an unmanned platform in the North Sea disrupted production in early 2019 for Aker BP, a Norwegian oil company, according to an account in the Wall Street Journal. The company installed an AI program that monitors data from sensors on the pump, flagging glitches before they can cause a shutdown, stated Lars Atle Andersen, VP of operations for the firm. Now he flies in engineers to fix such problems ahead of time and prevent a shutdown, he stated.

Aker BP employed a solution from SparkCognition of Austin, Texas.

Partnerships are forming throughout the industry. Exxon Mobil last year started a partnership with Microsoft to deploy AI programs to optimize operations in the West Texas Basin. The AI is needed to interpret data coming from millions of sensors that monitor Exxon refineries all over the globe. Total S.A., the French multinational oil and gas company, is partnering with Google to better interpret seismic data with the goal of better exploiting existing assets.

Advances in machine learning and the falling cost of data storage are factors in the move to AI in big oil. “When you mention data at this scale to data scientists, you can see them start salivating,” stated Sarah Karthigan, data science manager at ExxonMobil. The company has a database consisting of about five trillion data points. “The intent here is that we can run our plants more efficiently, more safely and potentially with fewer emissions.”

Sarah Karthigan, Data Science Manager, Exxon Mobil
With the price of oil low, oil and gas companies are looking for efficiencies. Deployment of AI in upstream operations could yield savings in capital and operating expenses of $100 billion to $1 trillion by 20205, according to a 2018 report by PwC.  .... "