Quick! For Bakken Newbies, What's Equinor? -- July 26, 2018

Choose among the following:

• the chief valkyrie living deep inside Valhalla
• second in command to Darth Vader; a transgender and thus the name ("Equi-")
• former name of Statoil  
• the last name of Putin's translator, short for Equinatsky
• one of the many My Little Ponies, the greenish-purple one

Why am I asking? A reader sent me the link to this press release:

Ambyint, the emerging player in AI-powered artificial lift and production optimization, and international energy major Equinor today announced that Equinor will deploy Amybint’s technology on all rod pump wells in Equinor’s Bakken asset in North Dakota.

The partnership comes at the end of a successful pilot and will expand to full field implementation in this asset. 

During the pilot, Equinor was able to automate rod pump well optimization through use of Ambyint’s autonomous setpoint management functionality.

By identifying wells that were over-pumping or under-pumping, controller set points were adjusted with minimal human interaction. This kind of proactive machine-driven optimization resulted in increased production rates and pump efficiency while reducing well volatility.

“The Ambyint technology has improved the remote data visibility and has delivered a more accurate diagnostic of downhole conditions to our rod pump wells in the Bakken. The Autonomous speed range management tool has leveraged the power of machine learning to optimize our wells by identifying and acting on real opportunities,” said Jack Freeman, Production Engineer for Equinor’s Bakken Asset. 

Ambyint.

Not to be confused with Ambien. 

Apparently Ambyint technology will allow the engineer to get a full night's sleep without having to wake up every hour to check on whether a given pump is over-pumping or under-pumping.