Adam Peltz, Author at Energy Exchange

Colorado Blazes the Path on Oil and Gas Data

By Adam Peltz / Published: May 21, 2015

8016200072_36046a718f_z This May has truly been a banner month for transparency of the oil and gas industry. To start, FracFocus, the state-run, national hydraulic fracturing chemical disclosure database, released chemical information of nearly 100,000 wells in raw digital format. On the same day, Colorado’s Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC) put two key datasets online that will also increase what we know about oil and gas development.

Providing access to quality data is good for the public. The recently released data will help the public track oil and gas complaints and understand more about the quality of wells across the state. This is significant, as researchers can now analyze these data sets to uncover patterns of well issues that can ultimately lead to environmentally protective policy solutions – the Big Data revolution in a nutshell. By making its data easily and fully accessible to the public, Colorado is helping to lead the way when it comes to responsibly managing oil and gas development. Read More »

FracFocus Enters the Era of Big Data

By Adam Peltz / Published: May 7, 2015

The identity of the chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing fluid has been a key policy issue since the beginning of the shale revolution a decade ago. Now, that chemical information just became publicly available in a whole new way.

Today, FracFocus, the nationwide state-run hydraulic fracturing chemical registry database, made its chemical data publicly available as a raw data download – bringing FracFocus into the modern era of Big Data where large information sets can be analyzed for actionable patterns and trends.

In the past, data about the chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing were obtainable only on a well-by-well basis and only in PDF format. With nearly 100,000 wells registered with the FracFocus program, this made collecting and analyzing broad chemical information a nearly impossible task for researchers and the public. Read More »