Limiting risks

The figure is astounding: three-quarters of all oil rig projects finish in failure. However, such projects can cost several million dollars to petrol companies. To limit risks, petrol companies no longer hesitate to invest massively in IT tools. “The invention of new geological concepts, the remarkable progress of prospecting and new methods for characterising, modelling and monitoring reservoirs all constitute domains where developments frequently and regularly bring into question what was established the previous year,” stated Yves-Louis Darricarrère, Vice-President of Total, during the last edition of the Journées Annuelles du Pétrole in October 2008.
The latter illustrated his argument by reporting that in Pau (in southwest France), the group’s scientific and technical centre acquired a calculator with a capacity of 120 Teraflops (Floating Points Operations Per Second)! “It allows us to compute advanced seismic imagery algorithms much more quickly, enabling us to obtain better quality underground images.”
Modelling reservoirs constitutes precisely one of the privileged domains of the IFP (Institut Français du Pétrole). This French Petrol Institute has developed, for the last twenty years, simulation and modelling software distributed by its partner Beicip-Franlab. “Our software uses two types of data,” explains Marie-Christine Cacas, Project Coordinator for research into basin modelling at the IFP. “Data provided upstream by seismic studies as well as data gathered during reconnaissance drilling carried out by petrol companies and which serves to characterise underground architecture and to ascertain its composition.”
At the same time, companies are exploring developments in field monitoring – a key issue in the next few years. The purpose of this activity is no other than to quantify and improve the performance of fields being mined via metrology, so as to reduce the expenses of capital invested. To respond to these new challenges, petrol companies and their service providers will have to shift towards digital visualisation of petrol fields in real time.
To reach such results, petrol groups are notably placing their bets on time-lapse (4D) seismic processing. This is a matter of carrying out a seismic study after the normal production phase and comparing it with that which was initially carried out, in order to identify which zones have been badly drained. “We are also looking to match seismic studies carried out on the surface with other technologies that intervene inside the well,” indicates Jean-Jacques Postel, Head of Research and Development at CGGVeritas. Amongst the techniques on the cards are electromagnetic detection and microseismic monitoring. Notably using technology developed by Magnitude, a joint subsidiary of CGGVeritas and Baker Hugues, which consists in listening to minute vibrations in the reservoir in order to identify the way in which fluid is circulating in the rock, as well as to diagnose fractures in the reservoir and possible corridors that may limit the recuperation of hydrocarbon.