Focused Seismic CO2 Monitoring: from detection to characterization.
Paper presented at the Geoconvention 2023, may 15-17, Calgary Telus Convention Center, presented by Victoria Brun1.
Written by: Victoria Brun1, Sandy ( QiaoZhi) Chen2,Spotlight 1 Whitecap Ressources Inc.2
Abstract
Carbon Dioxide (CO2) injection has been used for Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) in the Weyburn field in southeast Saskatchewan in Canada for over 20 years. Since 2000, time-lapse (4D) seismic has been an essential surveillance tool to ensure safe and optimized development throughout the field (Chen et al., 2021).
After a successful blind-test over the Weyburn field (Brun et al., 2022), Whitecap piloted an innovative light 4D seismic monitoring system from SpotLight. This technique targets focused areas for dynamic CO2 detection in the reservoir by using only one source/receiver pair per subsurface reservoir location (spot). To catch this dynamic, two monitor surveys have been acquired 8-month apart and the results were encouraging and positively corroborated with the injection and production data within the monitoring period.
Over the last two years, this focused seismic technology is continuing to advance its processing technique to enhance the reflected waves using a single trace. The new method provided more robust and reliable 4D traces not only to detect CO2 presence in the reservoir, but the integrity of the caprock.