GEOPHYSICS, VOL. 76, NO. 3 (MAY-JUNE 2011); P. V47–V57, 12 FIGS., 1 TABLE.
10.1190/1.3554383
High-frequency anomalies in carbonate reservoir characterization using
spectral decomposition
Yandong Li1, Xiaodong Zheng1, and Yan Zhang1
ABSTRACT
Low-frequency shadows have often been used as hydrocar-
bon indicators in the application of spectral decomposition. The
reason behind the low-frequency anomaly has been explained
as high-frequency energy attenuation caused by hydrocarbons.
However, in our practice on carbonate reservoir characteriza-
tion in two areas, Precaspian Basin and Central Tarim Basin,
China, we encountered high-frequency anomalies, i.e., the iso-
frequency slices or sections at high frequencies exhibit anoma-
lies associated with the good carbonate reservoir, particularly in
the tight limestone background. We used the product of poros-
ity and thickness as a parameter to measure the quality of the
carbonate reservoir of each well and classified the 46 wells in
our two studied areas into three types. Type I wells contain
high-porosity thick reservoirs, type II wells contain reservoirs
INTRODUCTION
Spectral decomposition is an effective method in reservoir
characterization, especially in carbonate reservoir characteriza-
tion. While using spectral decomposition for carbonate reservoir
characterization, a number of cases have been reported that car-
bonate gas reservoirs exhibited so-called low-frequency shadows
(Sun et al., 2002; Wang, 2007). The term “shadow” refers to a
lowering of seismic frequencies from reflectors immediately
beneath a reservoir horizon. For example, Sun et al. (2002)
reported that for a fractured carbonate reservoir, the spectral am-
plitude below the reservoir formation is severely attenuated on
the 60-Hz instantaneous spectral analysis (ISA) component rela-
tive to the 40-Hz panel. The reason behind this low-frequency
anomaly was explained as high-frequency energy attenuation
caused by the gas reservoir, suggesting that low-frequency
shadow can be used as a direct hydrocarbon indicator.
Manuscript received by the Editor 15 March 2010; revised manuscript received 12 September 2010; published online 13 May 2011.
1
Research Institute of Petroleum Exploration & Development, PetroChina Co. Ltd, Beijing, China, 100083. E-mail: liyand@petrochina.com.cn;
zxd@petrochina.com.cn; zya@petrochina.com.cn.
C 2011 Society of Exploration Geophysicists. All rights reserved.
V
V47
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with moderate porosity and thickness, and type III wells contain
only low-porosity thin reservoirs. The results were that 12 out
of 13 type I wells exhibit high-frequency anomalies, and 30 out
of 33 type II and type III wells do not exhibit high-frequency
anomalies. We further validated the existence of this high-fre-
quency anomaly by forward modeling analysis and fluid substi-
tution experiments using the actual well-log curves measured in
the carbonate reservoir. The results showed that in our two stud-
ied areas the high-frequency anomalies are more common than
low-frequency shadows that can be observed only when the
thickness of the reservoir is more than half of the wavelength or
the reservoir rocks are extremely unconsolidated. Therefore,
this high-frequency anomaly may be used as a more reliable in-
dicator for a good carbonate reservoir than low-frequency shad-
ows in real applications.
To better understand this low-frequency shadow phenomenon,
Tai et al. (2009) analyzed detailed forward models and found
that reservoir thickness and acoustic impedance are the major
factors that control the spectral responses of the seismic signal
in a thin layer. If the reservoir thickness varied less than 20%,
they found that velocity is the dominant factor that influences
the peak frequency shift.
Despite the prevalence of the low-frequency shadow idea,
some people also reported that high-frequency anomalies can
occur instead of low-frequency shadows. Burnett et al. (2003)
reports a case from Alondra field in the Burgos Basin, Mexico, in
which the reservoir is significantly brighter than surrounding
reflections in the 40-Hz ISA frequency components, where in the
20-Hz ISA frequency component, the reservoir is not bright. Bur-
nett et al. (2003) ascribes this anomalous amplitude to thin-bed
tuning and gas charge. The gas charge makes the reservoir reflec-
tion coefficients larger than those in the adjacent brine-filled
V48
areas, and the thin-bed tuning effect of those large reflection coef-
ficients preferentially reflect higher frequencies.
In our practice on carbonate reservoir characterization in two
areas, Precaspian Basin and Central Tarim Basin, China, we
encountered high-frequency anomalies instead of low-frequency
shadows. The isofrequency slices or sections at high frequencies
exhibit anomalies associated with good carbonate reservoirs,
particularly in the tight limestone background. We validated the
existence of this high-frequency anomaly phenomenon by for-
ward modeling analysis. Rather than using the classic three-
layer wedge models to illustrate the effect of layer thickness
and velocity on spectral responses of seismic signals, we use the
actual well-log curves measured in the carbonate reservoir, as
suggested by Hart (2008) that we should match the attribute
response of the synthetics to the attribute response of the real
data. The results for our reservoirs show that high-frequency
anomalies are more common than low-frequency shadows. The
goal of this paper is to better understand what causes such spec-
tral anomalies, particularly in carbonates. To do so, we first
present two examples on carbonate reservoir characterization
using spectral decomposition. In both cases, the high-frequency
isofrequency sections better delineate the carbonate reservoir
encased in the tight limestone. We then perform forward model-
ing analysis and fluid substitution experiments using the meas-
ured well-log curves to investigate the cause of such frequency
anomalies. We conclude with a summary of our findings and a
proposal in spectral decomposition workflow.
REAL DATA EXAMPLE 1: PRECASPIAN BASIN
Our first data example is from the Precaspian Basin, which
is an elliptic paleodepression located at the southeastern corner
of the European plate. The sedimentary fill of the basin can be
divided into two major packages (presalt and postsalt) sepa-
rated by a series of the Kungurian salt. The presalt sediments
Figure 1. Arbitrary line through the seismic data volume. Per-
mian salt domes are indicated by the white arrows. The seven
horizons from the top to the bottom represent J: bottom of Jurassic
formation; Salt: top of salt dome; P1: base of salt dome; KT1: top
of Carboniferous formation, also the top of the first carbonate for-
mation; MKT: base of the first carbonate formation; KT2: top of
the second carbonate formation; VISEAN: base of the second car-
bonate formation. The two arrowed lines indicate the two carbon-
ate formations.
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Li et al.
were deposited in a remnant oceanic basin formed during the
Middle Devonian. Platform carbonate and clastic deposition
occurred along the basin margin, and euxinic conditions were
present in the basin’s center (Barde et al., 2002). Carbonate
reservoirs are developed in the Carboniferous formation under
the Permian salt overhangs, as indicated in the seismic profile
in Figure 1. The seven horizons from the top to the bottom are
J: bottom of Jurassic formation; Salt: top of the salt dome; P1:
base of the salt dome; KT1: top of Carboniferous formation,
also being the top of the first carbonate formation; MKT: base
of the first carbonate formation; KT2: top of the second car-
bonate formation; and Visean: base of the second carbonate
formation. The huge salt domes in this area pose great difficul-
ties to seismic processing and the following reservoir character-
ization. There are two target layers in this area. The first is the
Upper Carboniferous dolomite reservoir, and the second is the
Middle Carboniferous limestone reservoir, as indicated by the
two arrowed lines in Figure 1. Our experience has found that
the spectral decomposition is an effective method in delineating
the carbonate reservoir encased in the tight limestone in the
second layer, which is the focus of this paper. We employed
the Wigner-Ville distribution-based spectral decomposition
method that has advantage in time and spectral resolutions as
demonstrated in Rauch-Davies and Ralston (2005) and Li and
Zheng (2008).
Figure 2a is a zoomed inline profile intersecting a prolific oil
and gas well A0 through the original seismic data volume. The
position of the profile is marked by the black line in Figure 3. The
target layer is bounded between two horizons KT2 and H0. H0 is
an intermediate horizon that forms the base of most oil and gas
reservoirs in this second carbonate formation. Well A0 encounters
two layers of carbonate reservoir within the target zone. The
thickness of the first layer is 5 m with an average velocity of 5480
m/s, and the thickness of the second layer of reservoir is 14 m
with an average velocity being 5070 m/s. The average density of
the first layer of the reservoir is 2.60 g/cm3, and the average den-
sity of the second layer of the reservoir is 2.54 g/cm3. The back-
ground tight limestone has an average velocity of 6350 m/s and a
density of 2.65 g/cm3. Figure 2b and c shows the corresponding
profiles through the 20-Hz and 50-Hz isofrequency volumes,
respectively. The position of the carbonate reservoir is indicated
by the inserted porosity well-log curves. Note that the 20-Hz iso-
frequency section does not show anomalies associated with the
carbonate reservoir, and the 50-Hz isofrequency sections clearly
exhibit anomalies corresponding to the carbonate reservoir
encased in the tight limestone. The difference profile between the
50-Hz and 20-Hz isofrequency sections is shown in Figure 2d.
Because different isofrequency sections have different scales of
spectral amplitude with the low-frequency component having
much larger amplitude, the direct subtraction of high-frequency
and low-frequency spectral components would be dominated
by the energy of the low-frequency component. Therefore,
the two isofrequency sections must be properly normalized
before subtraction. The normalization method is described as
follows.
We denote the 50-Hz isofrequency section as m(50) and the
20-Hz section as m(20). Because the amplitude distribution of
m(50) and m(20) is similar, if we rescale the range of m(50) and
m(20) into [0 1], these two isofrequency sections could be
directly subtracted. That is,
 High-frequency spectral anomalies V49

mð50Þ ¼ ðmð50Þ  minðmð50ÞÞÞ=ðmaxðmð50ÞÞ

 minðmð50ÞÞ; (1)

mð20Þ ¼ ðmð20Þ  minðmð20ÞÞÞ=ðmaxðmð20ÞÞ

 minðmð20ÞÞ; (2)
where m(50) and m(20) denote the normalized spectral compo-
nents, max and min denoting the maximum and minimum of the
spectral components. The spectral difference profile d(m) can be
obtained by subtracting m(50) and m(20).
Note in Figure 2d that the carbonate reservoir-induced anoma-
lies are more obvious on this difference profile, whereas the
other anomalies not associated with carbonate reservoirs in Fig-
ure 2c disappear or exhibit reduced amplitudes, suggesting that
spectral differences might be an effective tool to map porosity
in this survey.
To see the horizontal distribution of the carbonate reservoir in
this area, we plot the energy computed between KT2 and H0
horizons of the original seismic data, as well as the 20-Hz and
50-Hz isofrequency volumes in Figure 3a to 3c.
Figure 3a and 3b is similar because the seismic wavelet is
dominated by the low-frequency components. There is a signifi-
cantly different behavior showed by the 50-Hz isofrequency
image. There are a total of 38 wells in this area, 10 of which
contain high porosity (/>12%) and relatively thick (h > 5 m)
reservoir within the target zone indicated by the solid black
circles . Four wells contain reservoirs with moderate porosity
(9 < / < 12%) and moderate thickness (h < 4 m), indicated by
the symbol of . Another 24 wells contain thin reservoirs
(h < 3 m) with low porosity (/ < 9%), indicated by the solid
white circle *. We can see from Figure 3c that of the 10 high-
porosity wells, nine wells are located in the anomalous red-col-
ored area. Four moderate-porosity wells are very close to the
anomalous area. Of the 24 low-porosity wells, 21 wells fall out-
side the anomalous area in Figure 3c. From these results, we
conclude that the 50-Hz isofrequency interval attribute delin-
eates the distribution of the carbonate reservoir.
We also extracted peak-frequency and peak-amplitude attrib-
utes from the spectral decomposition volumes, as suggested by
Zhang et al. (2008). Figure 3d is the energy of the peak-ampli-
tude volume between KT2 and H0, and Figure 3e is the average
peak frequency between KT2 and H0 calculated from the peak-
frequency volume. From these two results we can see that most
of the type I wells correspond to high-peak frequency although
most of the type II and type III wells correspond to the low-
peak frequency. However, the energy of the peak-amplitude vol-
ume does not show good correspondence between type I wells
and high-peak spectral amplitude.
Wells A1 and B1 illustrate the difference between the high-
and low-porosity wells on original seismic amplitude and isofre- Figure 2. (a) Zoomed vertical slice through the seismic amplitude
quency sections. Well A1 is a prolific oil well with a thick volume. The target layer is between horizons KT2 and H0 in
high-porosity reservoir; well B1 is a poor well with a thin low- which carbonate reservoirs are developed. Corresponding profile
porosity reservoir (Table 1). Figure 4a displays an arbitrary line through spectral magnitude volumes m(f) for the (b) f ¼ 20 Hz; (c)
f ¼ 50-Hz isofrequency volumes. (d) Normalized difference pro-
connecting wells A1 and B1 through the original seismic vol- file dm ¼ m(50) – m(20), between 50-Hz isofrequency profile in
ume, in which we can see great differences between the wave- (c) and 20-Hz isofrequency profile in (b). The position of the pro-
form of seismic traces at A1 and B1. The seismic trace at well file is marked by the black line shown in Figure 3.

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V50 Li et al.

Figure 3. Energy computed between the KT2

and H0 horizons of (a) original seismic ampli-
tude, (b) 20-Hz isofrequency volume, (c) 50-Hz
isofrequency volume, (d) peak-spectral ampli-
tude volume, and (e) peak-frequency volume.
There are a total of 38 wells in the Precaspian
Basin example, 10 of which encounter high-po-
rosity (/>12%) and relatively thick (h > 5 m)
reservoirs within the target interval indicated by
solid black circles . Four wells contain reser-
voirs with moderate porosity (9 < / < 12%) and
moderate thickness (h < 4 m) indicated by the
symbol . Another 24 wells contain thin reser-
voirs (h < 3 m) with low porosity (/ < 9%) indi-
cated by solid white circles *. Note the
excellent correlation of the high-porosity wells
with the 50-Hz component and poor correlation
with the amplitude and 20-Hz component. The
black line marks the position of the profile AA0
shown in Figure 2.

Table 1. Reservoir parameters of wells A1 and B1.

Well Reservoir thickness (m) Average porosity (%)

A1 22.9 12
B1 10.5 8.8

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 High-frequency spectral anomalies V51

A1 shows high-frequency continuous patterns, and the seismic

traces at B1 show low-frequency chaotic reflection patterns. Fig-
ures 4b and 4c show the corresponding line through the 20-Hz
and 50-Hz isofrequency volumes. We can see well B1 exhibits
weaker amplitude than well A1; however, in the high-frequency
50-Hz isofrequency section, although well A1 shows remarkable
high-amplitude anomalies that correlate to the overlaid porosity
curve, well B1 does not exhibit any anomalies. We plot the nor-
malized difference profile between the 50-Hz and 20-Hz isofre-
quency profiles in Figure 4d and note that well A1 exhibits
strong amplitude anomalies in the difference profile, whereas
well B1 does not show any anomalies.
Based on the known geological background, well drilling
results, and the above analysis, we come to the conclusion that
the 50-Hz isofrequency attributes do a good job in delineating
the distribution of our carbonate reservoir encased in the tight
limestone. Sedimentary facies analysis finds that the reservoir in
this area is composed of high-energy shoals in Wilson’s (1975)
carbonate platform facies model.

REAL DATA EXAMPLE 2: CENTRAL TARIM

BASIN, CHINA
The second example is from the Central Tarim Basin, north-
west China. A 6500- to 9500-m thick sedimentary sequence,
consisting of Cambrian to Tertiary strata, rests on an Archaean
and Proterozoic crystalline basement. The Lower-Ordovician
mainly consists of platform carbonates, and the Middle-Upper
Ordovician mainly consists of marginal slope-shelf carbonates
(Jin et al., 2006). Reef and shoal facies carbonate reservoirs are
developed in the Upper-Ordovician in our studied area. The tar-
get layer is very deep, with a burial depth of more than 5500 m.
The dominant frequency of the seismic data at the target level is
only about 18 Hz, making reservoir description very difficult
(for more information concerning this area, see Zheng et al.,
2007; Li and Zheng, 2008). Figure 5a is an inline profile
through the original seismic data volume intersecting well C1,
one of the prolific oil and gas wells. The target layer is between
the maximum flooding surface (MFS) and sequence boundary 3
(SB3) horizons. The seismic reflection exhibits a mounded pat-
tern associated with organic reef buildups. Below the reservoir
there are strong reflections that are associated with dissolved
caves. The corresponding profiles through the 20-Hz and 40-Hz
isofrequency volumes are shown in Figure 5b and 5c, respec-
tively. The reservoir appears to be continuous on the 20-Hz
panel but is discontinuous on the 40-Hz panel. Comparing these
two isofrequency profiles, we find that the 40-Hz isofrequency
profile shows anomalies associated with the carbonate reser-
voirs. We plot the normalized difference profile between the 40-
Hz and 20-Hz isofrequency sections in Figure 5d. The normal-
ization method is given in the previous section. We can see in
Figure 5d that the reservoir images are enhanced in the differ-
ence profile. Figure 4. Arbitrary line BB0 connecting high-porosity thick reser-
To view the lateral distribution of the reservoir, we compute voir well A1 with low-porosity thin reservoir well B1 through the
(a) seismic amplitude, (b) 20-Hz isofrequency, (c) 50-Hz isofre-
interval root-mean-square (rms) attribute maps between the MFS quency, and (d) normalized difference between the 50-Hz and
and SB3 horizons through the original seismic volume and the 20-Hz isofrequency volumes. Location of the line is shown by the
two isofrequency volumes and display the results in Figure 6a to white line in Figure 3c.

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V52
Figure 5. (a) Vertical slice CC0 including an oil and gas well C1
through the original seismic amplitude that clearly shows the shelf
margin. Reefs are developed in the shelf margin. Corresponding
vertical slices through the (b) 20-Hz isofrequency, (c) 40-Hz iso-
frequency, and (d) difference between the normalized 40-Hz and
20-Hz isofrequency volumes. Location of the line is shown in
Figure 6.
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Li et al.
6c. Comparing Figure 6b and 6c, we see remarkable differences
between the low-frequency and high-frequency attribute maps.
There are a total of eight wells in this working area. Among them,
three wells that are prolific oil and gas producers encountered
good carbonate reservoirs in the target layer. These three wells
are indicated by the solid black circle. Another five wells indi-
cated by the solid white circles did not encounter good reservoir,
exhibiting only oil and gas shows. We see in Figure 6c that the
three prolific oil and gas wells with good carbonate reservoirs are
all located in the anomalous area indicated by the red color. The
remaining five dry wells that do not encounter carbonate reser-
voirs are all located outside the anomalous region in Figure 6c.
Integrating the known reservoir distribution revealed by the exist-
ing wells and the geological background in this area, we conclude
that the high-frequency interval attribute at 40 Hz better delin-
eates the carbonate reservoir.
FORWARD MODELING ANALYSIS
To better understand the high-frequency anomalies, we gener-
ate a suite of synthetic models using two wells in the Precaspian
Basin example. In this example, the quality of the well-logs is
good and the available data are relatively abundant, whereas the
well-logs at the target layer in the Central Tarim Basin example
are of poor quality due to engineering problems in drilling
the big caves in the reef reservoir.
We selected one prolific oil well that contains a thick reser-
voir in the tight limestone and another dry well whose reservoir
thickness is relatively thin. The parameters such as reservoir
thickness and porosity of the two wells are shown in Table 1.
We set P-wave and density curves to be constant outside the tar-
get layer; the segment within the target layer is kept unchanged
to highlight the effect of reservoir parameter variation on the
seismic response. We generate a synthetic P-impedance profile
using these two modified wells and compute the synthetic seis-
mic profile using the convolution model and a 30-Hz zero-phase
Ricker wavelet that approximates to the dominant frequency of
seismic data in this area at the target level. The P-impedance
profile is shown in Figure 7a and the corresponding synthetic
seismic profile is overlaid. The two short lines marked in the
well path curve represent the top and base of the target forma-
tion in the two wells. The P-impedance of the reservoir is within
the range of 12,500 and 14,500 g/cm3.m/s, which is represented
by green to red color, with light colors indicating the low-im-
pedance, high-porosity reservoir. Figure 7a shows the lateral
change in impedance between well B1 and A1. The number of
reflection events increases and the dominant frequency
increases.
Figure 7b shows the envelope-weighted instantaneous fre-
quency (EWF) profile corresponding to the synthetic seismic
profile in Figure 7a. Here we use EWF instead of the original
instantaneous frequency because the EWF produces a more ro-
bust estimate of frequency in cases of noise and the zero-cross-
ing points as indicated by Barnes (2007). Figure 7b shows that
the EWF at the target interval increased rapidly from the thin
reservoir with low porosity in well B1 to the thick reservoir
with high porosity in well A1, implying that EWF can be used
 High-frequency spectral anomalies V53

Figure 6. Root-mean-square attribute maps com-

puted between the MFS and SB3 horizons
extracted from the (a) original seismic data, (b)
20-Hz isofrequency, and (c) 40-Hz isofrequency
volumes. Vertical slices along CC0 are shown in
Figure 5.

Figure 7. (a) P-impedance model profile built using wells A1 and B1 and the corresponding synthetic seismic profile using a 30-Hz zero-
phase Ricker wavelet. Well A1 is a prolific oil well with thick reservoir in the target layer, and well B1 is a dry hole with thin reservoir. Note
the number of reflection events increases between wells A1 and B1, resulting in an increase in the dominant frequency. (b) EWF correspond-
ing to the synthetic seismic profile in Figure 7a. The EWF at the target interval increases rapidly from the thin reservoir with low porosity in
well B1 to the thick reservoir with high porosity in well A1. (c) 20-Hz isofrequency section. (d) 50-Hz isofrequency section.

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V54
as a good indicator for detecting the porous carbonate reservoir
encased in the tight limestone.
To see the spectral decomposition response of this synthetic
seismic profile, we plot the 20-Hz and 50-Hz isofrequency sec-
tions in Figure 7c and 7d. In Figure 7c, the porous carbonate
reservoir does not show any anomalies in the 20-Hz isofre-
quency section, whereas in the 50-Hz isofrequency section in
Figure 7d, the porous carbonate reservoir encased in the tight
limestone background exhibits a strong anomaly. The porous
carbonate reservoir-related anomalies in Figure 7d correlate well
with the EWF profile in Figure 7b.
SYNTHETIC MODELING WITH WELL A0
To test the effect of reservoir thickness and porosity on the
spectral decomposition response, we performed systematic syn-
thetic modeling using well A0. Because porosity is linearly well
correlated with velocity as described in Figure 8a, we can change
the P-wave curve to reflect changes in reservoir porosity. We sys-
tematically changed the thickness and velocity at the target layer
(the density is kept unchanged) and then calculated the synthetic
seismic profile and the corresponding EWF profiles. To see the
effect of fluid types on the seismic response, we performed fluid
substitution using Gassmann’s equation, and the parameters of the
fluids are calculated by Batzle-Wang’s equation (Batzle and
Wang, 1992). The target layer at well A0 has a gross thickness of
14 m. The average velocity of the reservoir is about 5000 m/s.
Figure 8. (a) Crossplot of porosity to velocity of well A0 within
the target zone, which shows that porosity is well correlated with
velocity with a normalized crosscorrelation coefficient of 0.98. (b)
Colored image of pore structure of reservoir rocks in the second tar-
get layer KT2 in the Precaspian Basin examples. Pores are gener-
ally homogeneously distributed and relatively well connected.
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Li et al.
Using a 30-Hz Ricker wavelet with a dominant wavelength of
167 m, we note that the reservoir thickness of 14 m is far below
the one-quarter wavelength 42 m that is the tuning thickness.
Chopra and Marfurt (2007) pointed out that for a relatively thick
gas reservoir that offers a sufficiently long travel path, the energy
absorption may shift the spectral energy from high to low fre-
quencies. However, when the reservoir is insufficiently thick,
there would be little attenuation on the seismic response. Con-
versely, the velocity change of the reservoir that caused the im-
pedance structure would be the dominant factor determining the
seismic spectral response.
Figure 9 shows the P-wave log of well A0, the corresponding
synthetic seismic trace (red), and the real seismic profile. The
correlation of the synthetic seismic trace (blue) to the composite
seismic trace (red) is good with a normalized crosscorrelation
coefficient exceeding 0.90. This high correlation gives us confi-
dence in our fluid substitution results. The dominant target layer
is marked by the rectangle, as indicated by the porosity curve.
The lower threshold of porosity in this area is set to be 7%, so
we only plot the porosity curves falling between 7% and 15%.
We can see an obvious decrease in velocity of the reservoir
from a background 6350 m/s of the tight limestone to 5000 m/s
of the reservoir (about 21% decrease in velocity). Figure 10a
shows synthetic seismic traces for a suite of velocities ranging
between 3000 and 7000 m/s at an increment of 500 m/s. Note
that low-reservoir velocity results in larger reflectivity and con-
sequently stronger seismic reflections.
Figure 10b displays the EWF profile corresponding to the
seismic profile in Figure 10a. From Figure 10b, we can see that
EWF decreases rapidly when the reservoir velocity exceeds
5000 m/s.
Next, we modeled the effect of reservoir thickness on the
seismic response and EWF. Figure 11a shows the seismic profile
when the reservoir thickness changes from 0 to 100 m (the res-
ervoir velocity is fixed at 4500 m/s). The corresponding EWF
profile is shown in Figure 11b.
Figure 9. (a) Synthetic seismic trace, (b) composite seismic trace,
(c) seismic profile, (d) P-wave log, (e) porosity log of well A0.
The correlation of the synthetic seismic trace to the composite
seismic trace is good. The target layer is marked by the rectangle
and the black arrow. We can see an obvious decrease in velocity
of the reservoir from a background 6350 m/s of the tight lime-
stone to 5000 m/s of the reservoir.
 High-frequency spectral anomalies
From Figure 11a, we can see that when the thickness of the
reservoir changes from 0 to 100 m, the seismic response under-
goes a complex pattern of amplitude variation. The amplitude
first increases and then decreases, similar to the tuning curved
described by Widess (1973). At tuning thickness (which is at
about 37.5 m), the amplitude reaches its maximum value. Figure
11b shows that the EWF also achieves its maximum value at
the tuning thickness.
THE EFFECT OF FLUID TYPE ON SEISMIC
RESPONSE
Besides thickness and velocity, the reservoir fluid type also
influences the seismic response. Therefore, we performed a
fluid substitution experiment for the reservoir fluids at the target
layer in well A0. We first substitute oil by brine in the target
layer. The resulting elastic parameters of VP/VS and density are
calculated using Gassmann’s equation and the fluid property
was obtained by Batzle-Wang’s equation using the existing data
on pressure, temperature, and salinity. The result corresponding
to oil substituted by brine is shown in Figure 12a, and the
result of oil by gas is shown in Figure 12b. Adam et al. (2006)
points out that Gassmann’s fluid substitution theory applied to
carbonates when the rocks consist of round pores, vugs, or
micritic textures. This is basically the case in the Precaspian
Basin data examples at the second target layer KT2 where the
matrix porosity is well developed that is roughly homogene-
ously distributed with approximately round pores, as can be
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V55
demonstrated in the pore structure photo and the crossplot of
velocity to porosity in Figure 8. Therefore, Gassmann’s fluid
substitution theory applies to this example. In the second
example at Central Tarim Basin, China, where the reservoirs
contain big caves, Gassmann’s fluid substitution theory will be
inapplicable.
We see from Figure 12a and 12b that fluid substitution of oil
by brine or oil by gas does not have a significant effect on
velocity and density. Therefore, the fluid types do not have a
significant effect on seismic response and the spectral decompo-
sition response.
DISCUSSION
We propose the idea that high-frequency anomalies are more
common than low-frequency shadows in real applications. The
reason is that when the gas reservoirs are relatively thick (usu-
ally more than half of the dominant wavelength) there would be
sufficient travel path, and the resulted energy absorption would
shift the spectral energy from high to low frequencies. However,
when the reservoir is not thick enough (far below half of the
dominant wavelength), the effect of energy absorption on spec-
tral decomposition response would be small. To most carbonate
reservoirs that have an average velocity exceeding 5000 m/s, the
half-dominant wavelength would be more than 83 m with a
dominant frequency at around 30 Hz. However, the thickness of
most carbonate reservoirs is far below this. In most cases, espe-
cially in China, thin reservoirs are more common than thick res-
Figure 10. (a) Synthetic seismic profile corre-
sponding to a velocity variation from 3000 to
7000 m/s while reservoir thickness is fixed at 14
m using the actual log curves of well A0. The
background is the velocity model. (b) EWF pro-
file corresponding to the seismic profile in Figure
10a. The EWF decreases rapidly when the reser-
voir velocity exceeds 5000 m/s. The target layer
is indicated by the black arrow and the rectangle.
Figure 11. (a) Synthetic seismic profile using
the actual log curves of A0 when the reservoir
thickness changes from 0 to 100 m while reser-
voir velocity is fixed at 4500 m/s. (b) Corre-
sponding EWF profile. The target layer is
indicated by the black arrow and the rectangle.
V56
Figure 12. Fluid substitution results of oil by brine (panel a) and
oil by gas (panel b). The panel from left to right represents (a) the
synthetic seismic trace using the fluid-substituted velocity and
density curves, (b) composite seismic trace, (c) real seismic pro-
file, (d) velocity curve, (e) density curve, (f) porosity curve. The
well curves with red color correspond to brine cases and gas
cases, and the blue ones correspond to oil cases. A0 marks the
position of well A0. The target layer is indicated by the black
arrow and the rectangle. The zoomed profile of the velocity and
density curves within the target layer are shown below, in which
we can see that fluid substitution of oil by water and oil by gas
does not have a significant effect on velocity and density.
ervoirs. Therefore, low-frequency shadow phenomena are not
often observed in real applications.
CONCLUSION
Instead of the popular low-frequency shadows, we encoun-
tered high-frequency anomalies in carbonate reservoir character-
ization using spectral decomposition at two working areas, Pre-
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Li et al.
caspian Basin and Central Tarim Basin, China. We studied this
phenomenon through a systematic forward modeling analysis
using the actual logs measured in the carbonate reservoir. The
results show that this high-frequency anomaly is primarily due
to the velocity decrease of the reservoir and resulted from po-
rosity increase. This will cause higher reflectivity and increased
dominant frequency of the seismic record due to thin bed reflec-
tivity interference. The background here is that the reservoir
must be embedded in tight limestone that has a very high veloc-
ity. Furthermore, the reservoir should have a moderate thick-
ness, but far below the half of the wavelength. Otherwise, the
effect of attenuation would be strong that causes low-frequency
shadows. The fluid substitution experiments show that fluid type
does not have a significant effect on the seismic response when
the reservoir thickness and porosity is not high enough. The sig-
nificance of this paper is that the high-frequency anomaly could
be used as an indicator for detecting good carbonate reservoirs
encased in the tight limestone.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The work is co-supported by Key Project on Overseas
Hydrocarbon Exploration and Development, CNPC, and China
State Key Science and Technology Project on Marine
Carbonate Reservoir Characterization (2008ZX05004-006,
2011ZX05004-003). We are grateful to associate editor Kurt J.
Marfurt and three anonymous reviewers for their constructive
feedback and insightful suggestions that greatly improved the
quality of this paper.
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