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Abstract

DOI:10.1306/13171245St591798

Using 3-D Seismic Volumetric Curvature Attributes to Identify Fracture Trends in a Depleted Mississippian Carbonate Reservoir: Implications for Assessing Candidates for CO2 Sequestration

Susan E. Nissen,1 Timothy R. Carr,2 Kurt J. Marfurt,3 E. Charlotte Sullivan4

1Consultant, McLouth, Kansas, U.S.A.
2Department of Geology and Geography, West Virginia University, Morgantown, West Virginia, U.S.A.
3College of Earth and Energy, University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma, U.S.A.
4Pacific Northwest National Laboratories, Richland, Washington, U.S.A.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors would like to thank the Grand Mesa Operating Company for providing seismic and well data and Seismic Micro-Technology, Inc., Hampson-Russell Limited Partnership, and IHS Corporation for access to software. Rose diagrams were constructed with GEOrient software, courtesy of R. J. Holcombe, Holcombe Coughlin amp Associates Australia (http://www.holcombe.net.au/software/). This work was conducted while the authors were with the Kansas Geological Survey, University of Kansas (Nissen and Carr), and the Allied Geophysical Laboratories, University of Houston (Marfurt and Sullivan). The support of these institutions is gratefully acknowledged. Funding for this work was provided by the U.S. Department of Energy under contracts DE-FG26-03NT15438, DE-FC26-04NT15504, and DE-FG26-06NT42734.

ABSTRACT

The widespread Western Interior Plains aquifer system of the central United States provides a significant potential for sequestration of CO2 in a deep saline formation. In Kansas, several severely depleted Mississippian petroleum reservoirs sit at the top of this aquifer system. The reservoirs are primarily multilayered shallow-shelf carbonates with strong water drives. Fluid flow is strongly influenced by natural fractures, which were solution enhanced by subaerial karst on a Mississippian–Pennsylvanian regional unconformity. We show that three-dimensional (3-D) seismic volumetric reflector curvature attributes can reveal subtle lineaments related to these fractures. Volumetric curvature attributes applied to a 3-D seismic survey over a Mississippian oil reservoir in Dickman field, Ness County, Kansas, reveal two main lineament orientations, N45degE and N45degW. The northeast-trending lineaments parallel a down-to-the-north fault at the northwestern corner of the seismic survey and have greater length and continuity than the northwest-trending lineaments. Geologic analysis and production data suggest that the northeast-trending lineaments are related to debris-, clay-, and silt-filled fractures that serve as barriers to fluid flow, whereas the northwest-trending lineaments are related to open fractures that channel water from the underlying aquifer. The discrimination of open versus sealed fractures within and above potential CO2 sequestration reservoirs is critical for managing the injection and storage of CO2 and for evaluating the integrity of the overlying seal. Three-dimensional seismic volumetric curvature helps to locate fractures and is a potentially important tool in the selection and evaluation of geologic sequestration sites.

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