SUMIC: Multicomponent sea-bottom seismic surveying in the North Sea -- Data interpretation and applications
- Statoil Research Center, Trondheim (Norway)
A new concept, named SUMIC (subsea seismics), of acquiring four component data at the sea bottom has been developed. The development stage included an offshore acquisition of a 2D SUMIC seismic line using seismic detectors deployed at the sea bottom. The survey was undertaken over a reservoir in the North Sea where the main objective was to image the deep reservoir units through a gas chimney in the overburden above the reservoir. This has been an insoluble mapping problem for previously acquired conventional toward streamer 3D survey data. The image produced of the reservoir intervals from the vertical velocity component Vz data showed similar distortion to that obtainable from the conventional towed streamer data, because of P-wave misfocusing and attenuation introduced by propagation through the gas chimney. A more reliable image and interpretation of the reservoir intervals was produced from the X-component data which predominantly consist of inline S-waves. A Graben structure was identified at the top of the reservoir structure using S-waves for the first time from a marine seismic survey. Shear-waves are less affected by the presence of gas than P-waves. Statoil has demonstrated that SUMIC surveying is an effective tool with significant advantages over conventional marine seismic methods. The results have very interesting strategic implications for the use of this technology for structural and stratigraphic definition of reservoirs and exploration prospects.
- OSTI ID:
- 80243
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-941015--
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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