New Digital Well Data Contract to Advance Electronic Government Effort 

The Minerals Management Service will soon have access to better quality digital well data, due to a new contract with A2D Technologies.  The contract is another major step in the MMS electronic government effort. 

“Obtaining well data as an on-line service will assist MMS and industry in realizing time and cost savings, and provide citizens with more customized and user-friendly access to information,” said MMS Director Johnnie Burton.

The new electronic capabilities provided by the contract, along with the upcoming OCS Connect Project, will help MMS keep pace with the increasing complexity of oil and gas operations and greater workloads. Together, they will provide more sophisticated technical analyses and data exchange and ensure more accurate assessments of the nation’s offshore energy resources.  OCS Connect is a phased, multi-year e-Government transformation program that will dramatically reform and streamline business operations.

According to Burton, the electronic information provided will assist MMS improve and enhance its geologic and geophysical evaluations.  “Precise interpretation of this data is critical for much of the work done by MMS, especially in estimations of oil and gas reserves, geologic field determination, calculation of fair value, royalty relief determination, and reservoir conservation,” said Burton. “The new contract will ensure data quality and completeness, provide speed of delivery, and save a significant number of man-hours for the agency.”

The five-year contract calls for A2D Technologies to collect, process, and provide standardized digital well data for MMS and the public.  The contract, which became effective June 1, 2004, supports the MMS Gulf of Mexico, Pacific and Alaska regional offices

As the MMS agent, A2D will receive digital and hardcopy Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) well log data submitted by OCS operators, and then provide MMS with quality data sets for all OCS wells.  Digital vector data sets from all three of MMS’s regional offices will be stored by A2D.  As the data sets become releasable to the public, A2D will offer them for purchase, thus providing “one-stop-shopping” for digital vector data sets.  While A2D digital vector data for the Gulf of Mexico region will be available only from A2D, similar data for Alaska and the Pacific will also be available from MMS Alaska and Pacific regional offices. 

The Minerals Management Service is the federal agency in the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages the nation’s oil, natural gas, and other mineral resources on the Outer Continental Shelf in Federal offshore waters.  The agency also collects, accounts for, and disburses mineral revenues from Federal and American Indian lands.  MMS disbursed more than $8 billion in FY 2003 and more than $135 billion since the agency was created in 1982.  Nearly $1 billion from those revenues go into the Land and Water Conservation Fund annually for the acquisition and development of state and Federal park and recreation lands.