HOW

EMIDOI will explore an innovative virtual marketplace. The marketplace will host many different products & services aimed at supporting a specific business community of organisations, both public and private, which are engaged in decommissioning of offshore installations. These will encompass retrieval services using metadatabases and distributed databases, brokerage mechanisms and services, secure transaction facilities for buying publications and for subscribing to ons databases, search engines, geographical retrieval options and inclusion of multimedia features for improving user interfaces.

The project will provide new insights into the process of integrating existing and emerging technologies in an operational information service. The project will also explore a number of business models for different services and, by consulting both information providers and end-users, will provide extra insights for exploitation strategies that can be applied by the partnership in the further implementation of the EMIDOI service, and by other electronic publishers in various other content and market domains.

Planned developments

A key objective of the project is to prepare and to investigate the economic viability of an electronic marketplace by Internet, that will be an operational data & information service for managing, giving common access, acting as brokerage and exploiting a variety of public and private data and information resources.

The EMIDOI information service is planned as a virtual marketplace, consisting of a central 'portal' website and a number of distributed websites, managed and operated by providers of relevant data & information resources and services. The central website will host a number of information products and functions. Navigation from the portal to the distributed websites will be by a powerful search engine and a system of metadatabase(s) that are maintained by participating information providers and that point towards the actual data & information held at the providers websites and premises.

EMIDOI will develop a prototype for this system. The partnership encompasses 4 major data & information managers, 2 public and 2 private, with a focus on the North Sea oil & gas activities and the marine environment. Their data & information holdings and distributed websites will serve as the primary basis for development of the prototype portal. The public partners will act as a consultative group for guiding and evaluating the development and the choice of business models that will be incorporated to give access to public data sources. As part of the project they will also seek involvement and comments from other public departments, building upon their existing communication and information links with these organisations.

Central website - Portal site

The central website will provide the main gateway for internet users and will function as an intermediary platform towards data & information modules and central services, hosted at the central website, and towards information and service modules that are hosted partly or in whole at related partner and future participating websites. The central website will feature webpages with background information on the project, its partners and scope. It will also present EMIDOI as a virtual marketplace and give user interfaces to the various data & information modules and business user services that EMIDOI has to offer.

Platform and field data; decommissioning projects

This topic area will provide databases with detailed information of offshore installations in the North Sea, indications on decommissioning plans, including site maps, line drawings, images and factsheets of decommissioning projects, which are either underway or already executed. The EMIDOI partner Oilfield Publications Limited (OPL), as a major publisher of offshore reference publications, already manages basic datasets to start these services. Additional data & information will come from interaction with the marketplace, building on established contacts.

The data & information will be made available as databases with powerful search facilities, and will feature secure tools for possible future exploitation on a subscription basis. The user interface will involve alpha-numeric query options and a geographical interface by including on-line GIS functionality.

Business Directory and Exchange Forum

The portal website will host a Business Directory that will provide a forum for contractors, suppliers, consultancies, agencies and service companies related to decommissioning of offshore installations. These organisations will be able to publicise the scope and availability of their products and services. EMIDOI partners already manage basic registers to start the forum. Additional data will come from interaction with the marketplace.

The Business Directory will be developed as databases. Powerful search facilities will enable all suppliers of a particular service (including public suppliers) or product to be identified. Communication links to relevant industrial and public web sites will enable clients to request further information.

Public environmental data & information

Together with the public partners a metadatabase system will be defined and developed to index references to information such as baseline geochemical samples and analyses of the seabed around installations and documents that are of relevance as input for Environmental Impact Assessments. These include policy papers, environmental consultation guidelines, laboratory analyses, assessment papers, etc. The public partners already manage a major collection of relevant data and documents and are engaged in national assessments of decommissioning projects. Within these projects they are cooperating with other public organisations and research institutes that will be consulted to ascertain their views on the projected EMIDOI development.

Regulatory framework

These include international regulations, such as OSPAR and IMO and furthermore each country has its own local legislation and regulations. This information will be gathered country by country by contacting relevant ministries and by compiling all gathered information into a structured database.

Sounding board / forum

The EMIDOI project is a prepatory action towards possible full implementation and exploitation of the EMIDOI service concept. A number of the Workpackages are therefore dedicated towards surveys and dialogues with potential end-users and information providers of the EMIDOI service. To support this process the prototype website will feature a Sounding Board, where visitors can respond to user surveys (questionnaires) and bring forward their suggestions and comments in addition to other forms of communication.

Workplan
In general the approach will encompass the following activities.
A detailed matrix of relevant data & information will be determined. This will be based upon user surveys, both in the public and private domain, and based upon desk research and existing expertise of the EMIDOI partners.

With the information, already held by the partners, a prototype will be developed for the portal site, which will serve to demonstrate the goals and future layout of the portal site that will include exploration of metadatabase functionality, e-commerce functionality, forum / sounding board functionality and multimedia aspects.

Based upon the data & information matrix, a list will be composed of relevant source holding organizations, especially in the public domain and private interest organizations, like Offshore Suppliers Associations etc.

Practical solutions will be sought and defined with participating public organisations, for exploitation of their data & information, setting up regular updating schemes, and for public/private partnerships.

An overall exploitation strategy for the portal site will be developed that will be presented to potential end-users, who will be contacted both by survey and by selected visits.

All conclusions will be reported and will provide a sound basis for a further development and implementation of the portal site. The conclusions will consider content, functionality, exploitation, partnerships and economical viability of the EMIDOI service.