Data is Energy's Most Untapped Resource

Spreadsheets, SCADA systems, terabytes of old data, and a surprising amount of laughter, this one has it all. Jacob and Julie sat down with Bobby Neelon from Drill Down Analytics to finally ask the “dumb” questions most people are too shy to bring up about energy, oil and gas, and the mysterious world of data. Bobby breaks down how companies actually deal with messy files (yes, even those dusty paper records), why AI and machine learning are shaking up the industry, and what makes tools like Power BI, Spotfire, Snowflake, and Databricks different without getting lost in jargon. Along the way, we swap stories about the ridiculous challenges of working in spreadsheets, the quirks of SCADA, and what it means to move everything into the cloud. Whether you’re brand new to energy or secretly love a good data puzzle, this episode makes the complicated stuff easy, and pretty fun too.

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Click here to view the episode transcript.


00:00 - Intro
00:54 - What is data
03:36 - Does old data matter
05:54 - Biggest problems with data in oil and gas
11:54 - Pre-AI era in data analytics
15:38 - Importance of knowing end goals
18:24 - Jargon and terminology in data
19:20 - Overview of Spotfire
24:10 - Snowflake vs Databricks comparison
30:05 - High-tech advancements in oil and gas
32:10 - Understanding SCADA data
35:09 - Cloud storage solutions
37:20 - On-premises data management
41:38 - Future trends in data analytics
44:43 - Last minute file suffix game
50:30 - Introduction to YAML
52:28 - Outro

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