Driven by both the global energy transition and the imperative for cost reduction and efficiency enhancement, artificial intelligence (AI) has become a core force propelling transformation in the oil and gas industry. This paper aims to systematically analyze and explore the application scenarios and development trends of AI technology in key sectors of the oil and gas industry, clarifying how it drives the industry towards a new development model characterized by intelligence, high efficiency, and sustainability. It begins by examining the core drivers of the industry’s digital transformation and the requisite technological foundations, highlighting the deep integration of domain knowledge with AI technology as a crucial path for advancing the oil and gas industry from “experience-driven” to a new paradigm of “data & knowledge-driving.” Subsequently, the paper delves into the deep integration scenarios of AI across upstream, midstream to downstream by utilizing a matrix chart method from the perspectives of implementation complexity and value creation. The results demonstrate AI’s significant value in enhancing oil and gas recovery rates, reducing costs, improving efficiency, and ensuring safety, as well as core strategic development directions as responses. On this basis, it is proposed that the development of AI in the oil and gas industry will advance towards a new stage characterized by whole-industry-chain collaborative optimization, autonomous operations, and platform integration, leading towards a strategic pathway for the industry’s digital transformation.
Liu et al. (Mon,) studied this question.