Advanced Seismic Technologies Tight Gas Water Detection & Prediction Natural Fracture Detection Natural Fracture Prediction Natural Fracture Simulation

However, it is a given in the industry today that most of the “low-hanging fruit” among U.S. oil and gas reservoirs has been picked. Oil and gas exploration in this country is focused increasingly on finding resources located in more geologically complex, deeper, and lower-quality reservoirs.

NETL supports research in Exploration Technologies that is designed to improve the way an operator “sees” a reservoir prior to drilling.

NETL Oil and Natural Gas Program projects focus primarily on reducing the risks of exploration in unconventional geological settings through the development of tools to detect often-subtle “sweet spots” prior to drilling.

This is especially critical for “tight” (low-permeability), naturally fractured gas reservoirs that are playing an increasingly important role in U.S. natural gas supply. Detecting, predicting, and simulating these reservoirs' fracture systems is critical for realizing the potential of this tight gas resource.

Equally important is research that helps an operator avoid misidentifying some of these prospective tight-gas sweet spots by detecting the occurrence of water in subsurface formations thought instead to be saturated with gas.

In addition, new imaging technologies have contributed greatly to industry's improved drilling success, reducing risk and preventing many dry holes. The consensus is that oil and gas industry's greatest technological progress of the past 30 years has come in the area of  advanced seismic technologies,  along with huge leaps in computing power and efficiency to handle the vast amounts of seismic data.

This progress has enabled industry to produce a crisper, more coherent view of the subsurface. Such innovative imaging technologies help operators to find hydrocarbons in complex geological settings, such as the obscured reservoirs below the Gulf of Mexico's salt structures. They also help producers target more “stranded” oil and gas when optimizing infill drilling programs.

NETL research runs the gamut of Exploration Technologies—from innovative play concepts that help in developing broad assessments of oil and gas resource to tweaking that subsurface picture in a way that helps pinpoint those elusive pockets of bypassed hydrocarbons.

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