Response TNO-GDN to Petition for Open Well Database
Utrecht, 09-02-2021
TNO – Geological Survey of the Netherlands (TNO-GDN) has taken note of the petition to the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate on behalf of dGB Earth Sciences B.V. and PanTerra Geoconsultants B.V.: “Petition to support the creation of a comprehensive, consistent, open-source well database, for the entirety of The Netherlands”.
TNO recognizes the goals, developments and interests as described in the petition concerning the application of mining data for the acceleration of the energy transition. We recognize the need for improved access and quality of mining data. We see parallels with the knowledge agenda and research priorities of TNO-GDN. Through several projects and initiatives and in cooperation with stakeholders, TNO-GDN strives towards improvement and modernization to improve these issues.
The primary Dutch mining law data portal NLOG is continuously updated to meet changing data and information needs. During the summer of 2020, the NLOG Datacenter went live. The Datacenter is a central location to select and download larger quantities of license, borehole and production figure data. The Datacenter will continue to be improved in 2021.
In relation to the development of the National Key Registry of the Subsurface (BRO), mining law data such as borehole and license information are being standardized and ingested into the Key Registry. The objective of this effort is improvement of quality, visibility, public accessibility and reuse of this valuable information. At the time of writing, the concept data catalogs of these information objects are subject of public consultation.
In the field of Geodata, Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence innovations, TNO-GDN is following recent developments of OSDU and other ML/AI platforms with great interest. TNO possesses unique capability and knowledge on the subjects of ML and AI from a variety of industries, and is actively looking for applications in the mining and geodata industries. TNO has decided to join the OSDU group as Research and Development institute with a scope on ML/AI research and applications.
TNO-GDN carries out its role, assigned by Dutch mining law, as the manager and provider of mining law data. From this role and the function of “National Data Repository”, TNO is obliged to provide access to mining data to all market parties in an equal manner, whether or not they are a part of OSDU. Mining law data such as borehole, survey and log information cannot be publicly released before the end of their confidentiality term as mandated by the mining legislation. Businesses and organizations are free to ingest public mining law data from NLOG to process and distribute through OSDU or other platforms.
The petition in its current form ignores these ongoing projects and developments in the field of mining law data. TNO-GDN therefore cannot endorse the petition in this form. Our preference would be to strengthen existing efforts and stakeholder platforms, and to utilize these towards the acceleration of the energy transition. We invite the authors and signatories to this petition to cooperate on these subjects.
On behalf of TNO – Geological Survey of the Netherlands,
Ilja de Winter
Account Manager Mining Data