To meet the worldwide demand for increased oil production, 4D
Technology Inc. offers sophisticated software for improved petroleum
exploration and production. 4D seismic technology promises increased
oil yields, greater production efficiency, and higher profits
for oil companies. This next-generation of production technology
adds the fourth dimension: time lapse.
The First 4D Software Tool
4D Technology, Inc. announces the first available 4D software
tool to interpret multiple 3D datasets to extract real seismic
differences over time. The Lamont 4D Software program, processes
multiple 3D seismic surveys for time-sequenced data, updated
with well logs and production histories. It provides for the monitoring
of past drainage, prediction of future drainage, and calculation
of hydrocarbon volumes. The resulting understanding of the hydrodynamic
processes within reservoirs improves the performance of reservoir
simulators increasing yield and efficiency of oil production.
Improve Yields
How much will 4D technology improve yields? The preceding generation
of technology improved oil field yields from 2D's 25% to 30% to
3D's 40% to 50% recovery. BP/Shell's Foenhaven Field reported an expected
increase from use of 4D technologies to 65 to 75% recovery efficiency as
cited in Petroleum Engineer International, January, 1996.
Review Legacy Data Sets
With the Lamont 4D Rapid Analysis and Inversion Products you can
review legacy data sets to find passed over oil and gas for future
drilling and improve the initial producing rate. The analysis lets you
add infill drilling targets, aids in optimum facility planning
(since you neither overbuild nor underbuild), and saves dry holes. Even
dissimilar surveys can be analyzed using our correction and
normalization processthat includes patented (applied for) 4D seismic processing.
Benefits of Lamont 4D Software
The major purpose of the 4D Rapid Analysis Product is to provide a "Quick Look" tool to track changes of seismic amplitude over time as hydrocarbon pool drainage proceeds. The 4D Rapid Analysis Product modules are designed to extract differences and similarities among multiple generations of 3D seismic surveys (4D seismic data). The 4D Rapid Analysis Product provides a methodology whereby hydrocarbon drainage pathways and oil/gas/water locations and volumes can be mapped over time.
All visualization is implemented in real 3D space, but since we image only within grown-regions, we have intelligently downsized the datasets for rapid manipulation with standard workstation graphics capabilities. Also, the 4D Rapid Analysis Product provides an added set of utility modules to generate print-ready and secure, Internet mountable, html output easily.
The 4D Rapid Analysis Product contains five basic operations: data loading, data pre-processing, data interpretation, 4D differencing, and 4D visualization. We provide an on-line, web-based training manual, wherein we explain these 5 operations in 12 chapters. The complete procedures to fully analyze multiple 3D seismic datasets for 4D drainage and fluid migration changes can be learned by an experienced 3D interpreter within a month.
The 4D Inversion Product connects our 4D Rapid Analysis Product to a unique 4D seismic inversion and modeling package that is custom-designed to compensate for processing and acquisition differences between 3D seismic surveys. Impedance changes over time are determined and oil/gas/water volumes at each voxel are monitored. Expected oil and gas flow rates and volumes can be calculated for new well placements to capture bypassed pay and increase recovery efficiency.
As 4D seismic technologies are merging with reservoir characterization, acoustic impedances become the critical link between seismic and petrophysical property distributions in hydrocarbon reservoirs. Unlike seismic amplitudes, which measure relative acoustic impedance changes across interfaces, acoustic impedance is directly associated with velocity and density properties of rock and the fluids that fill pore spaces. Our 4D Inversion Product uses the existing acoustic logs in wells and a stochastic simulation technique to derive realistic acoustic impedance changes over time. The inverted acoustic impedance volumes are then used to derive reservoir characteristics and further quantify the drainage results obtained from our 4D Rapid Analysis Product's amplitude attribute extraction.
Most seismic inversion methods do not account for all aspects of seismic wave propagation, and are rather simple though cost-effective (e.g., the "run-sum" technique). Our nonlinear, 4D seismic inversion is a robust, least-squares minimization technique. It uses convolution as the seismic forward model to compute the seismic response of acoustic impedance at each iteration. The gradients of the model response versus acoustic impedance are used to update the acoustic impedance model continuously.
In the 4D Inversion Product, seismic wavelets are dynamically extracted from every seismic trace. We extract a wavelet "source and processing cube" unique to each 3D survey. We then extract the differences in acquisition and processing between surveys to produce normalized datasets ready for 4D differencing. As a result, we are able to image dynamic changes in reservoir fluids that have occurred between the acquisition times of the various 3D surveys.
The combination of the 4D Rapid Analysis Product,which gives better prediction of
reservoir drainage patterns, and the 4D Inversion Product, with its better prediction of
reservoir petrophysical property changes, significantly increases the accuracy of oil and
gas identification during the reservoir monitoring process.
Our organization is well equipped to use the Lamont 4D software to interpret and extract added value from multiple 3D seismic surveys. We have:
Our objective is to build relationships that are based on a combination of planning and independent interpretation services for specific company projects. 4D Technology, Inc. can act as a third party advisor to the emerging 4D reservoir monitoring sector. We also provide unique scientific interpretations of the data from specific project data as they come in over the life of the project.
Another service that we offer is the pairing of real-data
interpretation with our SP-2 based, elastic, 3D FEM simulation of both
compressional and shear changes expected with further drainage in a
field. Joint planning studies will become the basis for many decisions
concerning field experiments --from spacing and orientation of cables
to timing of reacquisition. The simulation would allow detailed
examination of the expected changes in reservoirs over time in both P
and S, and would be "interactive", in that our customer's scientists
and engineers would be fully engaged in the design of the simulations.
We are convinced that successful 4D monitoring will require that the
problem dictate the solution, as opposed to current practices where
the technologies available to each service company dictate the
monitoring techniques they propose.
Workstation Requirements:
CPU: Sparc 10 performance or equivalent
128 MB RAM minimum
512 MB swap space
1 GB disk space
Sun ZX graphic card or equivalent
AVS version 5.2 required
Software Parameters:
10 MB source code
64 MB executable code
337 KB on-line help
For more information on 4D Technology, contact:
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For 4D Consortium information, contact: |
