Excerpted from Hart’s EAGE Show Daily…
ION has found itself immersed in one of the hottest E&P plays of the last two decades – unconventional shale development. Since 2003, ION’s GX Technology group has processed more than 12,000 square miles of unconventional shale data from around the world.
In recent years, ION has extended their participation in unconventional shales beyond processing and now offers end-to-end services that include survey design and planning, technology provision, data processing and interpretation, and overall project management. ION has executed these full-scope projects in several North American shale basins and, like many E&P operators, is now turning its attention to the shales of Europe.
Scott LaBaume, ION’s Vice President of Solutions for North America, describes the evolution of shale development, “A few years ago, most E&P operators viewed shales primarily as engineering plays. The shales were known to be really extensive and were assumed to be homogenous. Since we knew where the shales were and were assuming the reservoir was homogeneous, many operators didn’t view seismic as a critical tool for reservoir development. E&P firms simply drilled horizontal wells and executed multi-stage hydraulic fracturing programs to bring them on production.”
“In recent years, that viewpoint has changed. The E&P community is beginning to realize that the assumption of homogeneity is flawed. Like any reservoir, these shales vary in terms of lithology and natural fracturing. If we can use seismic to identify rock types, brittleness, or fracture density and orientation within the reservoir intervals, we can help asset teams optimize well placement and hydraulic fracturing designs. For instance, we might help an asset team determine where to place their wells in the reservoir to maximize production and minimize hydraulic fracturing costs.”
ION has found that environmental issues are critical in many of the shale development areas. Many North American shale plays are often located underneath densely populated regions where man-made infrastructure and agricultural operations are prevalent or underneath government-stewarded lands in which oil & gas development needs to be conducted with the utmost environmental friendliness.
Several technologies are helping to improve the environmental profile of seismic operations. One is the increasing use of cableless acquisition systems. Several equipment companies, including ION’s 49% owned INOVA joint venture with BGP, have developed cableless systems which they claim reduce the environmental footprint of seismic operations, improve acquisition efficiency, and enable crews to get in and out of sensitive areas more quickly.
The FireFly system, frequently used by ION on its integrated shale projects, makes use of a sophisticated command & control system that allows surveys to be designed to avoid infrastructure or environmentally sensitive areas and that enables ‘stakeless acquisition’ in which deployment crews use GPS-guided handheld units to guide them directly to the source and receiver points, with spatial X-Y-Z information that is accurately recorded in the data headers.
According to LaBaume, “Many of the seismic contractors that have used these cableless programs in ‘shale country’ are beginning to see the advantages of these types of systems. In a recent Marcellus survey, the contractor recorded up to 952 shots per day in an area where the norm was more like 400. FireFly provided them with a real competitive advantage as they can access these sensitive areas for the E&P operators and then efficiently execute the programs.”
While the shale opportunity in North America is believed to be significantly larger than in Europe, many E&P operators have begun to secure acreage on the Continent. Austria, France, Hungary, and Poland have generated significant interest, including the first signs of exploratory drilling.
Wouter Kool, ION’s VP of Solutions Development for Europe commented, “Although Europe’s total resource potential from unconventional may be smaller than North America’s, the shale plays in Europe are still attracting considerable interest driven by both economic and geo-political considerations within the region.
“I think it’s fair to say that the shales in Europe will turn out to be just as heterogeneous as those in the States, and so seismic can play a key role in characterizing the natural fractures and brittleness of the reservoirs to help the engineers better target their wells and design hydraulic fracture programs for them. Moreover, higher service costs and even greater environmental sensitivity across Europe means that we need efficient, environmentally friendly seismic technologies in order to get the job done. I’m convinced that the shale plays in Europe will emerge as an exciting growth area for the seismic industry in the years ahead.”
To learn more, visit the ION page on the Unconventional Gas Center.
