NETL geo-data scientist Jennifer Bauer will discuss the Lab’s research activities focused on legacy oil and gas infrastructure — retired pipelines, platforms and other structures that remain in place after abandonment or end of use — at the Gulf Offshore Energy Safety Informational Webinar to be held from 11 a.m. to noon ET Thursday, Nov. 3, 2022.

An estimated 18,000 miles of inactive pipelines, which may still contain oil or gas, have been decommissioned across the Gulf of Mexico in the last 50 years. “These assets and others create risks for spills and leaks and can release methane, a potent greenhouse gas,” Bauer said. “Concern over this aging energy infrastructure in the Gulf will continue as additional oil and gas projects face the prospect of becoming stranded assets while the world transitions to low-carbon energy sources.”

During the upcoming webinar, Bauer will discuss research by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)/NETL to identify challenges and opportunities created by legacy oil and gas infrastructure. Bauer will be joined by panelists from Healthy Gulf and Oceana, organizations working to protect Gulf ecosystems. The webinar, presented by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, is free and open to the public. Click here to register.

As a geo-data scientist, Bauer relies on massive volumes of data that are compiled in databases and analyzed using computational tools such as machine learning to pull out key pieces of information that identify the likelihood of a hazard or the risk of an adverse event such as a pipeline leak.

Bauer served as principal investigator of the NETL team that developed Advanced Infrastructure Integrity Modeling (AIIM), a tool that integrates big data, big data computing, and multiple machine-learning and advanced spatial models to evaluate energy infrastructure integrity, identify potential infrastructure hazards, and support infrastructure use and reuse planning.

A product of work sponsored by DOE’s Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management offshore oil spill prevention program, AIIM also has strong and increasing relevance for offshore carbon storage and other energy applications in the transition to carbon-neutral solutions that may require the use of or alignments with aging oil and gas offshore infrastructure. This summer, AIIM earned a TechConnect National Innovation Award at the TechConnect World Innovation Conference and Expo.

Bauer is an active researcher in the Lab’s Offshore Research Program. The program’s projects focus on innovative solutions to solve the challenges associated with geohazard prediction, subsurface uncertainty reduction, and oil and gas infrastructure integrity and optimization for new and existing infrastructure systems.

NETL drives innovation and delivers technological solutions for an environmentally sustainable and prosperous energy future. By using its world-class talent and research facilities, NETL is ensuring affordable, abundant and reliable energy that drives a robust economy and national security, while developing technologies to manage carbon across the full life cycle, enabling environmental sustainability for all Americans.