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Results
Summary A high-quality 3D pre-stack Kirchhoff depth imaging has significantly improved seismic images over a production field in the Gulf of Mexico. Higher frequency content, relative amplitude preservation, better steep dip accuracy and improved images around and below the salt dome have helped better ties with drilling results in the field. Introduction Production in this field is mainly from Pliocene reservoirs near and around a salt dome located in the center of the 3D area. The existing down-dip wells have watered out. Additional wells need to be drilled up-dip of these wells to capture reserves. The objective of imaging is to accurately pin point well locations right at the edge of salt flank. This requires accurate positioning of salt/sediment interface within a few traces.
- North America > United States (0.89)
- North America > Mexico (0.63)
- Geology > Structural Geology > Tectonics > Salt Tectonics (0.57)
- Geology > Geological Subdiscipline (0.36)
- Geophysics > Seismic Surveying > Seismic Interpretation > Well Tie (0.43)
- Geophysics > Seismic Surveying > Seismic Processing > Seismic Migration (0.37)
Summary Wave equation (or wave field extrapolation) techniques have been used in industry for the past few years, with the purpose to improve the accuracy of 3D depth imaging over the conventional Kirchhoff migration. However, on many field data examples using different wave equation implementations from different processing shops, we have seen high-quality imaging from both Kirchhoff and wave equation techniques. In the near future, we see that both Kirchhoff and wave equation implementations will continue to serve high fidelity imaging needs and also complement each other in terms of strengths and weaknesses. The benefits of wave equation methods would be significant and overwhelming, perhaps, when we have advanced the acquisition technology to obtain true 3D marine data in the future.
Summary We present a controlled-aperture wave-equation migration method that not only can reduce migration artifacts due to limited recording apertures and determine image weights to balance the effects of limited-aperture illumination, but also can improve the migration accuracy by reducing the slowness perturbations within the controlled migration regions. The method consists of two steps: migration aperture scan and controlledaperture migration. Migration apertures for a sparse distribution of shots are determined using wave-equation migration, and those for the other shots are obtained by interpolation. During the final controlled-aperture migration step, we can select a reference slowness in controlled regions of the slowness model to reduce slowness perturbations, and consequently increase the accuracy of wave-equation migration methods that make use of reference slownesses.