All service companies have proprietary tools and associated data deliverables, but most of the data measurements within these services are similar across the different service companies. The basic formation evaluation measurements of properties such as gamma ray, resistivity, formation density and porosity should be equivalent but the data curves that represent these measurements have different mnemonic names in each service company. Similarly for surface drilling measurements, all service companies monitor hookload, WOB, RPM, torque and pump pressure but these data curves all have different names in the delivered data files.

Unfortunately, the names used by service companies are not normally descriptive of the measurements taken or of the nature of the tools in use.

The Practical Well Log Standard (PWLS) categorizes the marketing names for logging tools and the obscure mnemonics used for the measurements using plain English. PWLS provides an industry-agreed list of logging tool classes and a hierarchy of measurement properties and applies all known mnemonics to them. The last version of PWLS, v2.0, dates back to 2003 and is mainly focused on wireline data from a handful of tools. Version 3.0 includes updated lists for generic tool and curve classes and has been expanded to cover four product lines: wireline, drilling, mudlogging and MWD/LWD. Plus, PWLS v3.0 associates the logging tools with the curves they measure.

PWLS version 3.0 candidate release is available for public review until August 15, 2020.

The PWLS v3.0 candidate release (zip) includes:

PWLS 3 logs (xlsx)

PWLS 3 properties (xlsx and xml)

Public review kick-off presentation

3 use cases for context (drilling safety, geophysicist, and regulatory)

Feedback form

A recording of the walkthrough presented by Energistics CTO, Jay Hollingsworth, also is available and may be useful for reviewers.

Three checkpoint sessions, approximately every 30 days, will be scheduled to review comments, to address questions that may arise during testing and to provide feedback in a live forum.

Please send feedback (preferably using the provided form), ask questions and let us know if you are interested in attending the 30 day review sessions via standards@energistics.opengroup.org.