seismic

Last year saw continued contraction in the seismic data-acquisition industry. With this drop in acquisition business, fewer seismic data-acquisition papers were published. Nevertheless, three very good SPE papers covering important acquisition and processing topics are featured here.

BP announced four discoveries in the Gulf of Mexico near existing platforms. It use advanced seismic imaging to identify resources in deepwater locations that can be developed cost effectively using platforms nearby.

Video games have been seen as a big waste of time for years by parents around the globe. But now, the oil and gas industry sees the underlying technology as a big time saver.

Seismic stimulation, achievable with the implementation of a single tool, requires significantly lower investments than gas, thermal, and chemical injection methods, with minimal environmental impact.

Understanding the behavior of subsea reservoirs traditionally takes months and millions of dollars. A new company says it can do this with a very targeted way in less than a week, for only thousands of dollars.

In the onshore world, one of the big advances for addressing increased sampling requirements has been to go to 24-hour shooting with continuous recording of simultaneously sweeping vibrators. This has been enabled by innovations in both acquisition and processing.

Schlumberger has decided to quit the seismic acquisition business due to poor financial returns.

Faced with big potential discoveries under terrain that makes good seismic imaging impossible, Total is rethinking how to gather the data it needs, with an idea that could change the face of seismic exploration.

The US Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has issued a final environmental impact statement (PEIS) for proposed geological and geophysical surveys of the Gulf of Mexico regarding possible oil and gas development.

"Today we know more about the surface of the Moon than our own seabed."—Sturla Henriksen, CEO of Norwegian Shipowners' Association