Neil R. Goulty

Combining wave-equation imaging with traveltime tomography to form high-resolution images from crosshole data

Traveltime tomography is an appropriate method for estimating seismic velocity structure from arrival times. However, tomography fails to resolve discontinuities in the velocities. Wave‐equation techniques provide images using the full wave field that complement the results of traveltime tomography. We use the velocity estimates from tomography as a reference model for a numerical propagation of the time reversed data. These “backpropagated” wave fields are used to provide images of the discontinuities in the velocity field. The combined use of traveltime tomography and wave‐equation imaging is particularly suitable for forming high‐resolution geologic images from multiple‐source/multiple‐receiver data acquired in borehole‐to‐borehole seismic surveying. In the context of crosshole imaging, an effective implementation of wave‐equation imaging is obtained by transforming the data and the algorithms into the frequency domain. This transformation allows the use of efficient frequency‐domain numerical propagat...

The role of fluid pressure and diagenetic cements for porosity preservation in Triassic fluvial reservoirs of the Central Graben, North Sea

Anomalously high porosities and permeabilities are commonly found in the fluvial channel sandstone facies of the Triassic Skagerrak Formation in the central North Sea at burial depths greater than 3200 m (10,499 ft), from which hydrocarbons are currently being produced. The aim of our study was to improve understanding of sandstone diagenesis in the Skagerrak Formation to help predict whether the facies with high porosity may be found at even greater depths. The Skagerrak sandstones comprise fine to medium-grained arkosic to lithic-arkosic arenites. We have used scanning electron microscopy, petrographic analysis, pressure history modeling, and core analysis to assess the timing of growth and origin of mineral cements, with generation, and the impact of high fluid pressure on reservoir quality. Our interpretation is that the anomalously high porosities in the Skagerrak sandstones were maintained by a history of overpressure generation and maintenance from the Late Triassic onward, in combination with early microquartz cementation and subsequent precipitation of robust chlorite grain coats. Increasing salinity of pore fluids during burial diagenesis led to pore-filling halite cements in sustained phreatic conditions. The halite pore-filling cements removed most of the remaining porosity and limited the precipitation of other diagenetic phases. Fluid flow associated with the migration of hydrocarbons during the Neogene is inferred to have dissolved the halite locally. Dissolution of halite cements in the channel sands has given rise to megapores and porosities of as much as 35% at current production depths.

Geomechanics of polygonal fault systems: a review

ABSTRACT Layer-bound systems of polygonal faults are found in sequences of very fine-grained sediments that have typically undergone passive subsidence and burial. In the absence of tectonic extension, the heave of the faults must be complemented by horizontal compaction of the sediments. Density inversion, syneresis and low coefficients of friction on fault planes have all been proposed as causal mechanisms for the development of polygonal fault systems, but most sequences that contain polygonal faults are not underlain by sediments of lower density and there is a lack of evidence to support the idea that syneresis is responsible. Laboratory measurements of clay properties and a recent field test based on well data strongly suggest that low coefficients of residual friction in fine-grained sediments are key to the growth of faults that eventually develop into polygonal systems. However, coefficients of residual friction apply to faults only after initial slip has taken place, so some other mechanism must be responsible for the initial nucleation of the faults. Various speculative suggestions have been made, but there is no evidence that nucleation of those faults that evolve into polygonal systems differs fundamentally from the processes involved in the nucleation of other faults in soft sediments.

Mechanics of layer-bound polygonal faulting in fine-grained sediments.

Abstract: Extensive polygonal networks of normal faults have reportedly been identified within layer-bound sequences in about 28 sedimentary basins worldwide. The gentle regional dips, passive tectonic settings and geometry of the fault networks have led to the conclusion that faulting must have resulted from gravity-driven mechanical compaction. The faulted sequences comprise very fine-grained sediments, with lithofacies that range from smectitic claystones to almost pure chalks. In most, if not all, cases it is clear that volumetric contraction has occurred with horizontal contraction of the sediments complementing the heave of the faults. One explanation which has previously been offered is that the fine-grained sediments have shrunk due to syneresis, a process that involves spontaneous contraction of the solid network with expulsion of the pore fluid. However, syneresis is an implausible mechanism because it does not explain the observed lithological variation in the sediments concerned, why the initiation of faulting occurs in the depth range 100–1000 m, and why faulting continues for millions of years. A much simpler explanation is that shear failure inevitably results from one-dimensional compaction if the coefficient of friction is sufficiently low; and there is some evidence from laboratory measurements that the coefficient of friction is likely to be exceptionally low in these fine-grained sediments. Qualitatively, low coefficients of friction also explain why these compaction faults preferentially dip towards the basin margin where the regional dip of the bedding is greater than 1˚. Furthermore, they help to explain the origin of a polygonal fault system in the Eromanga Basin, South Australia, where the situation is complicated by the presence of a low velocity, ductile layer at the base of the faulted sequence.

Reservoir stress path during depletion of Norwegian chalk oilfields

Pore pressure drawdown during reservoir depletion results in reduced horizontal principal stresses within a reservoir due to three distinct mechanisms: normal compaction, poroelastic behaviour and normal faulting. Established relationships, based on simplifying assumptions, give the ratio of the change in minimum horizontal stress, Sh, to the change in pore pressure, P, in terms of sediment properties for each mechanism. In spite of the approximations introduced by the assumptions, these relationships may be useful for discriminating between the mechanisms that control the reservoir stress path. For the Norwegian chalk oilfields, it is important to know whether normal faulting, in particular, is the governing mechanism because slip on active faults can shear well casings, and active faulting and fracturing can increase reservoir permeability. Previously reported field observations and laboratory measurements on chalk samples are compared to infer the mechanisms governing the reservoir stress path for the Ekofisk and Valhall fields. The amount of subsidence at the seabed observed at Ekofisk is evidence that the weaker horizons within the reservoirs are yielding plastically through pore collapse. Nevertheless, the reservoir stress path corresponds to that expected for poroelastic behaviour or normal faulting, and not that expected for plastic yielding.

Development of polygonal fault systems: a test of hypotheses

Polygonal networks of normal faults in layer-bound sequences of fine-grained mudstones have formed without regional tectonic extension. The two leading hypotheses concerning the generic mechanism responsible for their development are: (1) horizontal stresses are reduced by syneresis; (2) coefficients of residual friction are very low. To discriminate between these hypotheses, the ratios between the minimum horizontal and the vertical effective stresses have been estimated in four North Sea wells penetrating Oligocene and Miocene sequences that contain polygonal fault networks. The effective stress ratios are c. 0.8, consistent with very low coefficients of friction but not with syneresis.

Emplacement mechanism of the Great Whin and Midland Valley dolerite sills

The Great Whin and Midland Valley dolerite sill complexes appear to have been emplaced laterally from the walls of feeder dykes. The overall thickness of each sill increases with depth, as would be expected if the magma finally reached a state of hydrostatic equilibrium. Variations in the thickness of the sills with estimated intrusion depth imply that the head of magma was about 100 m below the contemporary ground surface in the areas of the present-day outcrops at the end of the intrusive episodes. Before hydrostatic equilibrium was established, the magma pressure would probably have been somewhat greater, so it is likely that intrusion of the sills was accompanied by the extrusion of flood basalts. Step-and-stair transgressions of the bedding are commonly found within the sills, mostly stepping downwards in the direction of bedding dip. The reason for this directionality is that the weight of sediments floating on an intruding sill has a downdip component that applies a tensile stress to intersecting fractures below the sill when magma is moving downdip, and to intersecting fractures above the sill when magma is moving updip.

Pore Pressure Estimation from Mudrock Porosities in Tertiary Basins, Southeast Asia

Porosity reduction during mechanical compaction of a sediment generally has been assumed to be controlled by the increase in vertical effective stress, which is convenient because vertical stress profiles may be readily calculated from density logs. Poroelasticity theory shows, however, that mean effective stress controls porosity reduction. According to published data, horizontal stresses increase with overpressure, as well as with depth, so mean stress and vertical stress profiles are poorly correlated in overpressured sections. We have used wireline logs to compare the pore pressures estimated in mudrocks by relating porosity to mean effective stress and to vertical effective stress for overpressured Tertiary sections in southeast Asia. Wells from three different basins were studied. Mudrock porosities were estimated from the sonic log response and sorted by lithology according to the natural gamma-log response. Two sets of normal compaction curves, relating porosity to mean effective stress and to vertical effective stress, were determined empirically by fitting data points where the pore pressure was thought to be hydrostatic. These curves were then used to estimate the minimum pore pressure corresponding to mudrock porosity values in the overpressured sections. The pore pressures inferred using the mean effective stress are consistent with direct measurements of pore pressure in the adjacent sands. In contrast, pore pressures inferred in mudrocks using the vertical effective stress are significantly lower for the overpressured sections, implying discontinuities in the pore pressure profiles at lithological boundaries, which cannot readily be explained. We conclude that the pore pressures estimated using the vertical effective stress are wrong and that empirical relationships between porosity and vertical effective stress should not be used for estimating pore pressures: porosity should be empirically related to mean effective stress instead.

Fluid flow due to the advance of basin-scale silica reaction zones

The conversion of biogenic silica (opal-A) to opal-CT (cristobalite and tridymite) in biosiliceous sediment causes increased rates of water expulsion because of the reduction in sediment porosity and dehydration of the amorphous opal-A phase. This release of water occurs over large tracts of sedimentary basins during sediment burial within discrete, diagenetic, reaction zones. Analysis of two-dimensional and three-dimensional seismic data sets from basins in the Northern Hemisphere provides geophysical evidence for a variety of fluid conduits and roughly circular erosional depressions at the contemporaneous seabed. We interpret these features as indicative of water expulsion and focused fluid flow emanating from opal-A to opal-CT reaction zones at burial depths within the range 200–800 m. The rate at which water is expelled depends upon the degree of porosity reduction and the weight fraction of bound water at the reaction zone as well as the rate of advance of the reaction zone. Where the reaction is actively taking place within homogeneous biosiliceous sediment, the rate of water expulsion is independent of the reaction rate. This is because water is released across the entire reaction zone; therefore, slow reaction rates are compensated for by expulsion of water across wider reaction zones. We calculate the rate and volume of water expulsion for the Faeroe-Shetland Basin, where the sediment immediately below the reaction zone contains, on average, ∼30% opal-CT by weight. The estimated volumetric rate of water expulsion per unit surface area at the present day is ∼6 m3 My−1 per square meter, which is greater than the vertical flux of water at the same depth from compaction of the deeper basin fill. The average volumetric rate of water expulsion is ∼120 km3 My−1 across the whole basin. Biogenic silica is particularly rich in Neogene successions in high latitude and equatorial regions, and where silica reaction zones are identified, they should be factored into sediment compaction and fluid-flow histories.

Mechanical compaction behaviour of natural clays and implications for pore pressure estimation

In pore pressure estimation and in basin modelling programs it is often assumed that porosity in clay-rich sediments depends on the vertical effective stress. An alternative assumption is that porosity depends on the mean effective stress. Yet triaxial test data on natural clays have shown that porosity depends on both the mean effective stress and the differential stress. Triaxial test data for Winnipeg clay are re-plotted here to quantify the errors in estimated pore pressures that would result if it is assumed that porosity depends on either vertical or mean effective stress. The assumption that porosity depends on vertical effective stress may result in gross underestimates of pore pressures in compressional basins, where horizontal stresses in overpressured zones at depth are greater than the vertical stress. Sections through the yield surface of Winnipeg clay are consistent with a generalized yield locus for clays, normalized for composition as well as volume, based on data from several natural clays. Consequently, a refined equivalent depth method of pore pressure estimation that accounts for porosity dependence on both mean and effective stress could, in principle, be implemented. The method would require some knowledge of yield properties and of all three principal stresses in the subsurface.