Development of digital technologies in petroleum industry and subsoil use in Russia: current state and future considerations

Creation and mainstreaming of digital technologies in all stages of geological exploration is in accordance with main provisions of the “Digital Economy of the Russian Federation” national project approved by the Russian Federation Presidential Executive Order No. 204 dated May 07, 2018 “National Objectives and Strategic Targets of the Russian Federation Development for the Period Until 2024”. The paper defines “digitization”, formulates the objective and main tasks implementation of which will significantly increase the effectiveness of geological exploration of subsoil, reproduction of mineral resource base and management of sustainable subsoil use. It is noted that despite the predominant use of imported hardware and software products, the country is developing its own hardware and software in almost all the areas of geological exploration activities, largely covering the functionality of imported tools and technologies. It is justified that for further development and introduction of domestic hardware and software, the state support in the form of research and development work order is necessary. The main areas of digitization in geological exploration are: development of new and further development of the existing software aimed at geological and geophysical information gathering and verification; creation of new hardware and software products and technologies; creation of new and updating of active GIS projects to address key problems of geological exploration of subsoil in accordance with functional areas of the Rosnedra activities. In the final part of the article, the authors discuss the factors that hinder active digitization, namely: difficulties of collecting and verifying many types of legacy data; the need to digitize much of legacy data, especially well data; the significant use of imported software tools, hindering development and introduction of Russian analogues; the practical lack of government investments in the development of science and specialist software in the area of geological exploration; shortage of staff having interdisciplinary competencies at the interface between geology and IT.