Going quantitative with 4D seismic analysis

It is demonstrated that time-lapse seismic signatures can be directly calibrated with historical data from producing and injecting wells via a reservoir simulator, material balance calculation or simply using the hard data. When this procedure is applied to a field over which two or more repeat surveys have been shot at different calendar times, the correlation coefficients that link the seismic difference signatures to the reservoir's pressure and saturation variations are determined. By utilizing several seismic attributes that respond differently to reservoir perturbations, pressure and saturation changes are then independently estimated. The approach is tested on synthetic data and then on data from the Schiehallion Field on the UK continental shelf, with favourable results. © 2006 European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers.