Innovation and prospect of geophysical technology in the exploration of deep oil and gas

Abstract

The global situation of distribution, reserves and production of deep oil and gas are examined systematically, the progress and exploration achievement of onshore China deep geophysical technology are summarized, and the challenges and developing direction of deep geophysical technology are pointed out. Aiming at the exploration of deep onshore strata in China, the article analyzes the key geophysical problems, such as low signal-to-noise ratio, low resolution, low imaging accuracy and low amplitude-preservation, in the exploration of deep clastic, carbonate, and volcanic reservoirs, and presents the corresponding technical countermeasures such as wide-line large-array 2-D acquisition, wide-azimuth and high-density 3-D acquisition, anisotropic pre-stack depth migration (PSDM), reverse-time migration (RTM), complex structure modeling, and quantitative reservoir prediction. The analysis from two aspects, imaging of deep complicated structures and prediction of deep complicated reservoirs, shows that wide-frequency, amplitude-preservation, high-accuracy and information integration are the challenges to and key issues in the geophysical technology. It is pointed out that wide-frequency seismic acquisition, rock physical modeling of complex reservoirs, high-accuracy prestack amplitude-preservation imaging, comprehensive evaluation of complex reservoirs, non-seismic techniques, and drilling steering with seismic data are the key geophysical techniques needed to be developed in the future. Key words: geophysical technology, deep oil and gas exploration, deep complicated structure imaging, deep complicated reservoir prediction