Offshore West Africa In 1997, we commenced a data collection service for oilfield development, offshore west Africa.

This service has evolved to match the development of the oilfield, and to move from a service based on tape and CDROM, to the use of satellite links and web-based delivery of data.

The development utilizes a Floating Production, Storage and Offloading facility (FPSO).  The DataHorizon computer is located on the FPSO, and is linked to interfaces with instrumentation and a subsea pod.

The onshore Processing Center controls data transmission, obtaining a 'snapshot' of the data every 30 minutes.  At night, using off-peak transmission capacity, the full-resolution data is retrieved for the previous day.

In the USA, reservoir engineers can access both the snapshot data, and the full archive of detailed data, through a variety of web-based screens. The local government also has a range of access, and for these users, the screens and data descriptions are available in their language. This system has been in operation since 1997, and has been expanded in step with the development of the oilfield.