Development of a 400 Level 3C Clamped Downhole Seismic Receiver Array for 3D Borehole Seismic Imaging of Gas Reservoirs

Abstract

Borehole seismology is the highest resolution geophysical imaging technique available today to the oil and gas industry for characterization and monitoring of oil and gas reservoirs. However, the industry's ability to perform high resolution 3D imaging of deep and complex gas reservoirs using borehole seismology has been hampered by the lack of acquisition technology necessary to record large volumes of high frequency, high signal-to-noise-ratio borehole seismic data. This project took aim at this shortcoming by developing a 400 level 3C clamped downhole seismic receiver array, and accompanying software, for borehole seismic 3D imaging. This large borehole seismic array has removed the technical acquisition barrier for recording the data volumes necessary to do high resolution 3D VSP and 3D cross-well seismic imaging. Massive 3D VSP{reg_sign} and long range Cross-Well Seismology (CWS) are two of the borehole seismic techniques that promise to take the gas industry to the next level in their quest for higher resolution images of deep and complex oil and gas reservoirs. Today only a fraction of the oil or gas in place is produced when reservoirs are considered depleted. This is primarily due to our lack of understanding of detailed compartmentalization of oil and gas reservoirs. In this project, we developed a 400 level 3C borehole seismic receiver array that allows for economic use of 3D borehole seismic imaging for reservoir characterization and monitoring. This new array has significantly increased the efficiency of recording large data volumes at sufficiently dense spatial sampling to resolve reservoir complexities. The receiver pods have been fabricated and tested to withstand high temperature (200 C/400 F) and high pressure (25,000 psi), so that they can operate in wells up to 7,620 meters (25,000 feet) deep. The receiver array is deployed on standard production or drill tubing. In combination with 3C surface seismic or 3C borehole seismic sources, the 400 level receiver array can be used to obtain 3D 9C data. These 9C borehole seismic data provide both compressional wave and shear wave information that can be used for quantitative prediction of rock and pore fluid types. The 400-level borehole receiver array has been deployed successfully in a number of oil and gas wells during the course of this project, and each survey has resulted in marked improvements in imaging of geologic features that are critical for oil or gas production but were previously considered to be below the limits of seismic resolution. This added level of reservoir detail has resulted in improved well placement in the oil and gas fields that have been drilled using the Massive 3D VSP{reg_sign} images. In the future, the 400-level downhole seismic receiver array is expected to continue to improve reservoir characterization and drilling success in deep and complex oil and gas reservoirs.