4D Seismic Ð Practicalities and Realities
20 April, 2011
4D Seismic – Practicalities and Realities
20 April 2011 Aberdeen Branch Evening Meeting
Chairman Walter Jardine, BP E&P
Overview
4D Seismic is increasingly being used to both characterise new fields and inform field life extensions. The ability to measure reservoir differences over time as they are developed and depleted can provide significant benefit to the operator. This benefit has a financial cost, but for existing fields, also a logistic cost as the requirements of the 4D survey may need to be compromised to work around the existing seabed infrastructure. This evening meeting will look at present 4D technologies, the implications of the subsea infrastructure and the results and benefits which can be obtained from 4D seismic surveys.
Presentations
4D Seismic Technology – An Operators View
Johnathan Brain, 4D Focal Point, Shell Europe
4D (time-lapse) seismic is now an established reservoir management tool and has been applied widely around the globe to a variety of reservoir types and production mechanisms. This talk looked at what it is, why we do it and considered the different acquisition options available, including permanent sea bed installations.
Integrating Permanent 4D Seismic Reservoir Monitoring and Subsea Production Facilities
Richard Luff, Installation Manager, Stingray Geophysical Limited
With the drive to increase reservoir productivity, more oil companies are choosing to instrument their fields with permanent arrays of sensors. These arrays are laid in a grid on the seabed and can cause considerable interface issues with existing pipelines, flowlines, umbilicals and mooring systems. Stingray outlined the technology involved and presented some recent cases where subsea infrastructure has caused interference to the array layout. Installation issues around congested areas were outlined with some possible solutions.
Integrated Time-Lapse Capabilities (4D Seismic)
Eric de Graaff, Chief Geophysicist, Fugro
4D seismic has evolved to be a standard method to monitor reservoir performance and by that one of the most important tools to optimise the production and reduce costs. Fugro presented the various aspects of 4D seismic from acquisition, via processing and inversion, to interpretation of the data, and examples of results obtained.