25516

Using Free Surface VSP Downgoing Multiples to

Obtain Unconventional VSP Image above the Well
Trajectory - A Case Study
T Nguyen Dac* (Schlumberger), M. Sanders (Schlumberger), P. Millot
(Schlumberger), F. Maula (Schlumberger), S. Rehman (Schlumberger), T.
Nguyen (Schlumberger), M. Lawson (Talisman Energy Vietnam), F.S. Jeow
(Talisman Energy Vietnam) & K. Tran (Talisman Energy Vietnam)

SUMMARY
The VSP technique is routinely used to create seismic images near the wellbore. A seismic source is
positioned below Mean Sea Level and deployed near the wellhead. The source signal is recorded by a
downhole receiver that is moved to cover a large number of depth levels in the well. The upgoing and
downgoing arrivals are separated during processing; the up-going wavefield is used for subsurface
illumination while the down-going wavefield and multiples are excluded from the processing. The
standard VSP technique using VSP upgoing wavefield gives a seismic image along the range of receiver
depths and below. It does not give any information of the seismic image above the top receiver depth
However, using the down-going wavefield has its own advantages, the sea surface multiple is used to
obtain a VSP image of formations above the top receiver depth which is unattainable with standard VSP
technique. The image obtained from the VSP multiples can have better resolution than the surface seismic
data, especially for the shallower reflectors which have better signal to noise ratio. The VSP data is true
amplitude, zero-phase and perfectly tied in depth and in time.

APGCE 2015, www.apgce.com

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 12 - 13 October 2015
Introduction

The Vertical Seismic Profile (VSP) technique is routinely used to create seismic images near the
wellbore. A seismic source is positioned at 5m below Mean Sea Level and deployed near the
wellhead. The source signal is recorded by a downhole receiver, that is moved to cover a large
number of depth levels in the well. The upgoing and downgoing arrivals are separated during
processing by a velocity filter, since they have opposite apparent velocities to each other. The
downgoing arrival is used to design a deconvolution operator that can then be applied to upgoing data.
Then, up-going wavefield is used for subsurface illumination while the down-going wavefield is
excluded from the remaining processing/imaging modules as it includes both direct arrivals and
multiples, and multiples are assumed to be unwanted energies in the conventional VSP imaging. The
standard VSP technique gives a seismic image along the range of receiver depths and below. It does
not give any information of the seismic image above the top receiver depth.

Surface System Surface System Surface System

Seismic tool Seismic tool Seismic tool

Seismic reflector Seismic reflector Seismic reflector

Fig-1a Fig-1b Fig-1c

Figure 1a The conventional VSP technique.

Figure 1b The sea floor – sea surface multiple (ghosts).
Figure 1c A formation reflection sea surface multiple. This follows closely behind the seafloor -
sea surface multiple (ghosts).

However, using the down-going wavefield has its own advantages. For example, wider subsurface
coverage can be achieved through the migration of multiples; also a higher fold can be achieved and
thus increase the signal/noise ratio in the subsurface illumination. In deep water, a VSP image can be
obtained from the sea surface downgoing multiple sequences. The first event seen in this sequence is
the sea floor, and all events following are reflections from formations below the sea floor. The main
application of processing the sea surface multiple is to obtain a VSP image of formations above the
top receiver depth which is unattainable with standard VSP technique. The sea floor - sea surface
multiple is always present in offshore VSP data, but in shallow water it is part the airgun source
signature, and is treated as such. It is removed from the data during the deconvolution. In very deep
water, the sea floor - sea surface multiple is completely separated in time from the airgun signature,
and is out of the time range of the conventional processing and interpretation steps.

APGCE 2015, www.apgce.com

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 12 - 13 October 2015
The sea surface multiple is actually a composite wavetrain of reflections starting with the sea floor
reflection and continuing on to reflections below the sea floor. This composite wavetrain of
reflections is more obvious when the sea floor has a low acoustic impedance contrast to the overlying
water layer, which is often the case in very deep water. The SSM-VSP data is essentially in “three-
way-time”. For comparison, the surface seismic data is recorded as “two-way-time”, and a
conventional VSP in “one-way-time”.

Sea floor - sea surface multiple with

near sea floor reflections following

Reflected Upgoing
Arrival (Standard VSP)

Direct Downgoing Arrival

Fig-2

Figure 2 An example of VSP data set (vertical component) recorded for the standard VSP
reflection sequence and the Sea Surface Multiple – VSP reflection sequence.

Virtual receivers

Original
Receivers

Reflector

Fig-3a Fig-3b

Figure 3a VSP acquisition principles. Sea surface downgoing multiples (orange) has larger
covered area than standard VSP upgoing (gray).
Figure 3b Schematic illustration of mirroring the velocity model and projecting the receiver for
free surface multiple.

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Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 12 - 13 October 2015
Method and Results

For the VSP acquisition, 4 shuttles Versatile Seismic Imager (VSI) downhole seismic tool was used
with 15m spacing, fitted with tri-axial accelerometer sensors. These sensors are omni-tilt, non-
gimbaled, having a flat amplitude response from 3 to 200 Hz, and a linear phase response over the
same interval. The surface source was a Triple Sodera G-gun cluster with a total gun volume of 450
cu.in and pressure was maintained at 2000psi throughout the survey. The sources were positioned at
5.0 m depth vertically above downhole receivers with vertical incidence VSP survey. The guns were
automatically tuned with trisor (surface airgun controller), which recorded also for every shot, the
near field signatures, gun pressure and gun depth.

208 VSP levels were acquired every 15m to cover the deviated well trajectory together with 28
checkshots acquired up to the sea floor for velocity control. The data processing steps included 3-
component data rotation to vertical, wavefield separation, deconvolution and migration. The upgoing
wavefield was processed to produce high-resolution images underneath the well path. The VSP
upgoing result (convention VSP image) will be used to correlate with surface seismic below the well
trajectory (see Fig-4a).

The surface related multiples recorded as downgoing waves, were also processed to produce an image
above the receivers, up to the sea floor which is unattainable with standard VSP technique. The sea
surface multiple (unconventional VSP image) will be used to correlate with surface seismic above the
well trajectory (see Fig-4b).
Sea Floor
Two-way Times (s)

Fig-4a Fig-4b

Figure 4a VSP upgoing (conventional VSP image) overlaid on surface seismic. Correlation
below receiver depth.
Figure 4b Sea surface downgoing multiple (unconventional VSP image) overlaid on surface
seismic. Correlation above top receiver depth.

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Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 12 - 13 October 2015
 Sea Floor Sea Surface
Downgoing
Multiple
(Unconventional
VSP Image)
Two-way Times (s)

VSP Upgoing
(Conventional
VSP Image)

Figure 5 Conventional VSP image and unconventional VSP mirror image of surface related
multiples, both overlaid on PSTM surface seismic line.
Conclusions
Results show that by using multiples, illumination coverage increases significantly in comparison to
using primaries. In addition, reflectors above the shallowest receiver can be imaged by multiples,
including the sea bed itself. This can be useful for different purposes such as shallow hazard
identification for sidetracks or to avoid the expense of in-fill nodal seismic below the rig. We also
showed that image obtained from the VSP multiples can have better resolution than the surface
seismic data, especially for the shallower reflectors which have better signal to noise ratio. The VSP
data is true amplitude, zero-phase and perfectly tied in depth and in time. Finally, by using the deep-
water surface related VSP multiples and the mirror imaging technique, the VSP image could be
extended successfully above the geophones up to the sea floor, with a good match with the surface
seismic.

APGCE 2015, www.apgce.com

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 12 - 13 October 2015