Identification and Characterization of Pressure
Seals through the Use of Wireline Logs:
A Multivariate Statistical Approach
Gerilynn R. Moline: Department of Geology and Geophysics, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Jean M. Bahr: Department of Geology and Geophysics, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Peter A. Drzewiecki: Department of Geology and Geophysics, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Lisa D. Shepherd: Department of Geology and Geophysics, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Abstract: A study is currently investigating the occur-
rence of abnormal pressures and the associated low-perme-
ability seals within the St. Peter Sandstone in the Michigan
Basin. These seals are commonly identified by examining
vertical-pressure profiles and noting the depths at which a
major change in the pressure gradient occurs. Additionally,
zones of very low permeability which may act as fluid seals
may also be identified on the basis of core analyses and well
tests. Often, however, there are an insufficient number of
direct pressure or permeability measurements to adequately
identify the depth and lateral extent of these seals. An alter-
native method for identifying and characterizing pressure
seals is through the use of wireline logs. Multivariate statis-
tical techniques can be used to segment the logs and group
the segments into electrofaciestypes. Application of this tech-
nique to four wells within the St. Peter Sandstone suggests
that the electrofacies characterization reflects both the hy-
draulic and diagenetic characteristics of the formation. In
particular, an electrofacies type has been identified which has
characteristics similar to those found within seals in other
basins.
INTRODUCTION
The phenomenon of abnormal pressures has received
considerable attention because of the problems inherent
in drilling into abnormal pressures and the question of
whether economically producible hydrocarbons exist in
overpressured reservoirs. In the past two decades, much
of the attention has been focused on understanding the
mechanisms contributing to pressure generation (Barker,
1972; Bradley, 1975; Magara, 1975; Fertl, 1976; Law and
Dickinson, 1985; Mudford and Best, 1989), and on meth-
ods for detecting anomalous pressures (Fertl, 1976).More
recently, the focus has turned to understanding the genesis
and characteristics of pressure seals themselves (Hunt,
1990; Powley, 1990; Tigert and Al-Shaieb, 1990). Low-
permeability seals associated with abnormal pressures are
of particular interest because of the suggestion that, in
many instances, seal genesis may be linked to depth-
dependent diagenetic processes (Powley, 1990) and could
provide a type of hydrocarbon trap not normally incor-
porated into exploration strategies. An ability to map the
vertical and lateral extent of very-low-permeability zones
362 The Log Analyst
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associated with abnormal pressures is critical to under-
standing the genesis of pressure seals.
At the University of Wisconsin-Madison, a study is
currently underway to investigate the origin and occur-
rence of pressure compartments within the St. Peter Sand-
stone in the Michigan Basin. This formation is a mature
quartz sandstone of Middle Ordovician age, with burial
depths ranging from less than 7,000 ft (2 km) to more
than 1 1,000ft (3.5 km) within the region of interest. Along
with the overlying Glenwood Formation, the St. Peter
Sandstone has been the focus of intense gas exploration
for the past decade.
In the Michigan Basin, anomalously high pressures have
been identified within the St. Peter Sandstone and the
Glenwood Formation from vertical-pressure profiles and
hydraulic-head distributions (Bahr, 1989). The locations
of the low-permeability seals associated with these pres-
sure anomalies are not presently known, however. This
region of high hydraulic heads occurs near Saginaw Bay
and extends into the northeast portion of the basin (Figure
1). Saginaw Bay is a regional discharge area for topo-
graphically driven flow, yet the hydraulic gradients in-
dicate downward flow in these formations in this area,
suggesting that low-permeability zones have prevented
equilibration with the present-day regional flow system.
Precise identification of zones of very low permeability
in the Michigan Basin is complicated by the lack of avail-
able core samples and direct pressure and permeability
measurements. However, borehole geophysical logs are
available for all of the deep Michigan wells, providing
both continuous vertical measurements and a wide dis-
tribution of data. While the wireline logs do not directly
measure permeability, the log responses are a function of
the lithology, pore-fluid composition, and porosity (As-
quith and Gibson, 1982). Because permeability is also a
function of lithology and porosity (Ahmed et al., 1989),
a correlation between composite log response and per-
meability should exist. This correlation can be used to
estimate permeability in wells for which direct perme-
ability measurements are not available.
In this study, an electrofaciesapproach is used to char-
July-AuguSt, 1992
 Pressure Seals Identification Using Wireline Logs

Wolverine Patrick & St. Norwich 2-28

A. Wireline Logs Principal Component Log

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--
Wolverine
Patrick & St. Norwich

Michigan Wolverine Patrick & St. Norwich 2-28

a’
B. Wireline Logs Principal Component Log

Figure 1: Map of Michigan showing the location of the wells

included in this study. Contours indicate hydraulic heads greater
than 1,100 ft (CI = 300 ft).
B
acterize the multivariate log response and to group the
core measurements. An electrofacies is a set of wireline-
log responses which characterizesa part of the formation,
permitting it to be distinguished from its surroundings
(Serra and Abbott, 1982; Serra, 1986). The name origi-
nates from the use of the term “electric logs” to refer to
the entire suite of wireline logs. It should be remembered
that electrofacies reflect not only the electrical properties
of the subsurface, but the acoustic and nuclear properties
as well. Figure 2: A, Principal-component analysis is applied to the
ELECTROFACIES CLASSIFICATION four logs in the left two tracks, resulting in the construction of
a first principal component (PC) log, shown on the right. The
Three steps are involved in the electrofacies classifi- PC log represents the sum of the variance of the four logs along
cation process: reduction of the multivariate problem the first principal component axis. Logs included in the analysis
down to a single variable, log segmentation,and clustering are the sonic (DT), microresistivity (MSFL), density (RHOB),
of the log segments into electrofacies types. The statistical and neutron porosity (NPHI). B, The PC log is segmented by
techniques used in these steps are not new to log analysis, maximum-liklelihood estimation, and the segment boundaries
only the method of application. are then transferred to the original logs. Segmentation is shown
Numerous algorithms for log segmentation can be found here superimposed on the original log trace.
in the literature (Testerman, 1962; Kulinkovich et al.,
1966; Gill, 1970; Webster, 1973; Hawkins and Merriam, In order to honor the contributions from the entire suite
1974). The majority of these techniques are applicable of logs, the multivariate problem is collapsed into a single
only to a single trace. Hawkins (1976) presents an algo- variable through the use of principal component analysis.
rithm for multivariate segmentation, but the size of the Geometrically, principal components define the axes of
data set is severely restricted. a hyper-ellipsoid formed by the variance-covariance

July-August, 1992 The Log Analyst 363

 Moline et al.

Electrofacies Classification
by Cluster Analysis

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Electrofacies Group

Figure 3: This dendrogram is a composite of all of the log segments from the four Michigan wells constructed by cluster analysis.
The plot graphically presents a hierarchical distance structure constructed from the multivariate means of the log segments. Six
clusters or electrofacies types have been created by cutting the dendrogram at the location of the dashed line.

structure of data points plotted in multidimensional space
(cf. Davis, 1986, p. 527). This multivariate statistical
technique has been successfully applied to problems of
zonation and well-to-well correlation (Elek, 1988) and is
particularly useful in cases where the input logs are highly
correlated, resulting in a concentration of the variance
along the first-principal-component (PC) axis. For the
wells included in this study, greater than 80% of the vari-
ance is accounted for by the first principal component.
In addition, examination of eigenvectors indicates that
the contributions from the four logs are nearly equally
weighted.
Figure 2A shows the PC log construction for one of the
four wells included in this study, the Wolverine Patrick
& St. Norwich 2-28 well. Four input logs were used in
this study based on their strong correlation to core per-
meability: neutron porosity (NPHI), density (RHOB),
sonic (DT), and a transform of the microspherically fo-
cused resistivity (MSFL). The PC log was constructed by
projecting standardized principal component scores onto
the PC axis. Standardization removes the effects of dif-
fering units of the input logs. For this well, 86% of the
variance occurs along the first principal component. The
problem is now simplified, and a univariate segmentation
algorithm can be applied to the PC log.
In the second step of the electrofacies classification pro-
cess, the PC log is segmented using a maximum-likeli-
hood estimation algorithm (Mehta et al., 1990). The al-
gorithm solves for the locations of segment boundaries
by maximizing the likelihood function for the log data,
assuming a constant signal within segments and super-
position of random noise. The program is interactive and
the user supplies the length of the window for filtering,
the length of the window for computing local variance,
and the segmentation threshold. The last parameter con-
trols the coarseness of the segmentation. In practice, the
parameters are varied within a narrow range, and the
segmented log is compared to the original PC log and to
the core values to arrive at a subjective determination of
the adequacy of the segmentation.
The results of segmentation of the PC log are shown
in Figure 2B, superimposed on the original log trace. The
output of the segmentation algorithm has been edited to
remove segments that are less than 3-ft thick for consis-
tency with the resolution of the logging tools. Once the
segmentation is completed, the segment boundaries are
applied to the original log traces and log values are then
averaged within the segments. In this manner, a multi-
variate mean is assigned to each segment.
The final step in the classification process is to group
similar log segments into electrofacies types through the
use of cluster analysis. The clustering algorithm estab-
lishes a hierarchy of distances in multivariate space on
the basis of the log averages assigned to each segment.
This hierarchy is shown graphically by the dendrogram
in Figure 3. Each data point represents a single log seg-
ment.
Cluster analysis establishes a distance structure only.

364 The Log Analyst July-AuguSt, 1992

 Pressure Seals Identification Using Wireline Logs

ANOVA for Different Grouping Schemes any point with a horizontal line. For this application, the
criterion is one that will optimize the separation of the
distributions of core porosities and permeabilities asso-

11
ciated with the log segments, because these are the pa-
rameters we are interested in estimating. To do this, the
core data are also segmented using the same segment
130 boundaries that were applied to the logs. The dendrogram
is cut into successively larger numbers of groups until the
best separation of permeabilities and porosities is
150
v) achieved. The “goodness” of this separation is achieved
110 when the F-scores from an analysis of variance for the
8
v)
permeability and porosity distributions are maximized.

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u. This maximization occurs at five groups for the perme-
ability distributions and at six groups for the porosity
distributions (Figure 4). The six-group scheme was chosen
because it incorporated optimal separation of both pa-
rameters, in spite of some redundancy in permeability.
For the four wells included in this study, six electro-
facies types were identified, as indicated in Figure 3. The
distributions of core values associated with the electro-
4 5 6 7 facies are shown graphically by box plots in Figure 5.
Number of Groups Note that, while the permeabilities in types I and I1 over-
Figure 4: Results of analysis of variance (ANOVA) show that
lap, the porosities are significantly different. Similarly,
the F-scores are maximized at five groups and six groups for the porosities in types I1 and IV overlap although the
permeability and porosity, respectively. A maximum F-score permeabilities are different. This indicates that the elec-
reflects the optimal grouping scheme. trofacies groupings are reflecting the non-linearity be-
tween the porosity and permeability. Two electrofacies
Choice of the appropriate number of groups depends on with similar storage properties may have very different
the application of outside criteria. Any number of groups flow characteristics and vice versa, an important point
between one and the total number of input data points when applying this technique to reservoir characteriza-
can be chosen simply by cutting the dendrogram along tion.

Permeability and Porosity Within

Electrofacies Groups Box Plots

maximum-

minimurn-
* -outliei

b
T

’ I II 111 IV v VI I II 111 IV
I
v
i1
VI

Figure 5: Box plots show the distributions of porosity and permeability within each of the six electrofacies groups determined
by clustering the log characteristics (Figure 3).

July-August, 1992 The Log Analyst 365

 Moline et al.

Wolverine Patrick & St. Norwich 2-28

Wireline Logs Core Analysis

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Figure 6: Electrofacies distribution in the Wolverine Patrick and St. Nonvich 2-28 well. The wireline logs are shown in the left
two tracks and the results from core-plug analysis are shown on the right. Log segments are indicated by horizontal lines through
the log traces and electrofacies types are indicated by shading.

APPLICATION TO THE MICHIGAN BASIN WELLS
The electrofacies method described above was applied
to four wells distributed across the basin (Figure 1). Two
of the wells, the Wolverine Patrick & St. Nonvich 2-28
and the Patrick Gilde 1-27, were located outside of the
pressure anomaly. The Hunt Martin 1-15 is located at
the edge of the pressure anomaly near Saginaw Bay and
the Mobil St. Foster 1- 12 is located in the region of high
hydraulic head in the northeast part of the basin.
The 13 segments in the Patrick & St. Nonvich 2-28
well have been clustered into four electrofacies types (Fig-
ure 6). Electrofacies type I is present only in this well, the
shallowest of the four wells with a depth of 7,920 ft (2.4
km) at the top of the interval shown. The highest poros-
ities in the St. Peter Sandstode within the Michigan Basin
occur in the region where this well is located. Two inter-
mediate-permeability electrofacies, types I11 and IV, and
the low-permeability type V are also present in this well.
The cored interval is from the upper St. Peter just below
the Glenwood contact.
The cored interval in the Patrick Glide 1-27 (Figure 7)
is also from the upper St. Peter and contains high-, in-
teremediate-, and low-permeability electrofacies, types 11,
111, and V, respectively. Note the depth of burial to the
top of the interval is now at 10,550 ft (3.2 km) but there
is still an absence of the lowest-permeability electrofacies
type VI.
The deepest of the four wells, the Hunt Martin 1-15
(Figure 8) contains the widest range of porosity and per-
meability. The top of the cored interval is at a depth of
11,306 ft (3.4 km), and the interval contains 200 ft (60.9
m) of core, again at the top of the St. Peter just below the
Glenwood contact. Note that the permeabilities decrease
with depth, with the lowest-permeability electrofacies type
VI present in the lower half of the interval.
Type VI is also present in the Mobil St. Foster 1-12
well (Figure 9). The depth to the top of the cored interval

366 The Log Analyst July-August, 1992

 Pressure Seals Identification Using Wireline Logs

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Figure 7: Electrofacies distribution in the Patrick Glide 1-27 well. Clustering has regrouped some of the adjacent log segments
into the same electrofacies. Types 11, 111, and V appear in this well.

is at just above 11,260 ft (3.4 km), but this is now the
lowermost portion of the St. Peter just above the Prarie
du Chien contact. Note the similarity in the interval depths
and the electrofacies types between this well and the lower
half of the Hunt Martin 1- 15 well.
RELATIONSHIP TO PRESSURE SEALS
The four wells chosen for this study represent a subset
of the available wells for which core permeability and
porosity have been measured. This subset, composed of
427 core measurements, was chosen to reflect a wide
geographical and vertical distribution. It was hoped that
by sampling in this manner, the data set would be rep-
resentative of spatial variations within the St. Peter Sand-
stone but would still allow a small set to be used as a test
of the methodology. In the final analysis, data from an
additional 2 1 wells comprising more than 1,500 core
measurements will be incorporated into the electrofacies
classification. It is anticipated that the geophysical- and
hydraulic-parameter distributions associated with the
electrofacies types will change somewhat with the addi-
tion of subs6ntially more data. However, the consistency
of characteriktics within electrofacies types between wells
separated by large distances is an indication of the po-
tential effectiveness of the method for determining the
spatial distribution of these characteristics at the basin
scale.
While the lithologic characteristics of each of the six
electrofacies are recognizable in core examination, those
of type VI are of greatest interest to our research because
of the focus on identification and characterization of low-
permeability seals within the St. Peter Sandstone. The
lithologic characteristics associated with some seals have
been documented. Hunt (1990) observed that the top seal
in many sandstones is layered with multiple horizontal
bands of carbonate cement. In the sandstones of the Simp-
son Group in the Anadarko Basin, Tigert and Al-Shaieb
(1990) observed alternating carbonate-cemented, silica-
cemented, and high-porosity intervals within a seal zone.
A model that incorporates mechanical and chemical pro-
cesses has been developed by Dewers and Ortoleva (1990)
to explain the formation of banded quartz cementation

July-A~gust,1992 The Log Analyst 367

 Moline et al.

Hunt Martin 1-15

Wireline Logs Core Analysis

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Figure 8: A 200-ft cored section from the Hunt Martin 1-1 5 well contains four electrofacies types, including the lowest per-
meability type VI. Permeability decreases with depth as reflected in the electrofacies distribution. (Note: a slightly different set of
logs is shown here. However, the electrofacies were determined using the same set of logs as in the other wells.)

in sandstones. Thus, we might expect to see diagenetic
banding in the form ofalternating cements and alternating
high and low porosity within sandstone intervals, which
act as pressure seals.
The lithologic characteristics of the type VI electrofa-
cies within the Hunt Martin 1- 15 and the Mobil St. Foster
1- 12 wells include diagenetic banding of both cement and
porosity types, moderate to abundant stylolitization, and
a predominance of quartz-overgrowth cement, often to
the total occlusion of porosity. In Figure 10, a segment
of core from the Mobil St. Foster 1- 12 well within a type
VI zone exhibits mm-scale alternating bands of dolomite
cement (D), quartz cement (Q), and high-porosity bands
(P). Also evident are stylolites (sty), concentrated pre-
dominantly along the boundaries of the bands.
Hydrologic characteristics within the type VI zones in-
clude porosities that range from <1% to 7%, with an
average of 3%, and permeabilities ranging from <0.05
md (5 x lO-I3 cm2) to 0.8 md (8 x cmz), with an
average of 0.1 md (1 x cmz). These values are
measured from core plugs at surface conditions and reflect
horizontal permeability to air. It should be noted that the
permeabilities will be one or more orders of magnitude
lower under in-situ conditions (Ahmed et al., 1989). In
fact, core data provided by Shell Western demonstrate a
decrease of 3-4 orders of magnitude when horizontal per-
meability was measured with brines under 5,000 psi (3.4
x lo7 Pa) confining pressure.
The wide range of variability of these parameters is a
result of the banding described above. In Figure 11, po-
rosity measurements from continuous thin sections
through an 1 1-ft (3.3-m) section of the Mobil St. Foster
1- 12 core demonstrate these porosity variations and their
correlation with the diagenetic bands. This observation
makes it clear that the permeability is significantly an-
isotropic within these type VI zones. A simple arithmetic
or geometric averaging of the values will severely over-
estimate the vertical permeability because flow paths must

368 The Log Analyst July-August, 1992

 Pressure Seals Identification Using Wireline Logs

Mobil St. Foster 1-12

Wireline Logs Core Analysis

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Figure 9: Three electrofacies types appear in the cored interval of the Mobil St. Foster 1-12 well. Note that these electrofacies
types are the same as those that appear in the lower half of the Hunt Martin 1-15, shown in the previous figure. The depths in
these two wells are roughly correlative.

cross the low-porosity bands. As a result, average vertical CONCLUSIONS

permeability under in-situ conditions within these type
VI zones is estimated in the nanodarcy range.
Geophysical log characteristics of the type VI electro-
facies include low sonic traveltime, low neutron porosity,
high density, and high resistivity. Average values are 57
ps, 0.005 porosity units (limestone), 2.62 g/cc, and 15
ohm-meters, respectively. Resistivity values ranged from
2-1,000 ohm-meters, reflecting the heterogeneity within
the rocks of this electrofacies type.
The presence of type VI electrofacies within only the
deepest two of the four logged intervals is consistent with
the Powley (1990) pressure-compartment model, which
suggests that the top seals occur at depths of roughly
10,000 ft (3,000 m). In addition, these two wells occur
within the region of anomalously high hydraulic heads.
These observations do not prove that the type VI zones
are, in fact, acting as low-permeability seals. However,
their occurrence at these depths and locations is consis-
tent with the theories and observations referenced above.
A multivariate statistical method for relating geophys-
ical log data with lithologic and hydrologic properties has
been applied to a test set of data from the St. Peter Sand-
stone in the Michigan Basin. Analysis of data from four
wells has resulted in the identification of six electrofacies
types. While the electrofacies classification was based
solely on the log responses, it was done in such a way as
to optimize the separation of distributions of porosity
and permeability associated with each electrofacies type.
It is expected that this separation will be enhanced by
enlargement of the data set.
An examination of cores from each of the four wells
demonstrated that electrofacies types reflect not only the
hydraulic characteristics, but the lithologic characteristics
as well. In particular, an electrofacies type has been iden-
tified that is associated with formation characteristics
consistent with those observed in pressure seal zones in
other basins. These Characteristics include low perme-

July-August, 1992 The Log Analyst 369

 Moline et al.

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Figure 10: A section of core from a type VI zone in the Mobil St. Foster 1-12 showing diagenetic banding. Bands of dolomite
(D) and quartz (Q) cement alternate with high porosity (P) bands which have formed as a result of intergranular pressure solution.
Stylolites (sty) are frequent within the type VI electrofacies.

The Log Analyst July-August, 1992

370
 Pressure Seals Identification Using Wireline Logs

Mobil St. Foster 1-12 surements associated with each electrofacies type will be
used to estimate values for these parameters where core
Depth Core Description Porosity (%) Quartz Cement (%) is not available. This technique is applicable to problems
(ft) 20 15 10 5 0 5 10 15 20 where determining the spatial distribution of hydraulic
I ,&,-I
characteristics is critical but where direct measurements
of those properties are insufficient.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
11276 The authors would like to thank Mobil Exploration and Pro-
ducing, Inc., Amoco Production, Shell Western E. & P., and
Western Michigan University for providing core analyses and
samples and digital logs. John Doveton and an anonymous

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reviewer provided helpful discussion and comments. This re-
11278 search was funded by the Gas Research Institute.

11280
11282
11284
KEY Quartz-cemented Band
Porous Band
Stylolite
Figure 11: Porosity measurements from image analysis of con-
tinuous thin sections in an 11-ft section of the Mobil St. Foster
1- 12 core within a type VI zone. Porosity is highly variable and
is controlled by varying concentrations of quartz overgrowth
cement occurring in a complex pattern of horizontal bands in-
dicated by the stippled regions on the left of the figure. Note
that this section is highly stylolitized.
ability, diagenetic banding, abundant quartz-overgrowth
cementation, and moderate to abundant stylolitization.
The occurrence of type VI electrofacies within only the
deepest two of the four logged intervals and in association
with regions of high hydraulic head indicates consistency
with theories about seal genesis and with the location of
potential pressure compartments within the St. Peter
Sandstone in the Michigan Basin.
In the future, additional wells for which core analyses
are available will be added to the data base, and char-
acterization of the log responses for each electrofaciestype
will then be used to assign class membership to log seg-
ments in wells that have no core data available. The sta-
tistical distributions of porosity and permeability mea-
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ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Gerilynn R. Moline received a B.A. in geology from the Uni-
versity of Southern Maine in 1986 and an M.S. in geophysics
from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1989. She is pres-
ently a doctoral candidate at the University of Wisconsin-Mad-
ison, majoring in geology with a concentration in hydrogeology.
Her current research interests are parameter estimation in het-
erogeneous systems and basin-scale flow modeling. She is a
member of AGU, GSA, AWRA, and AAPG.
Jean M. Bahr is an assistant professor in the Department of
Geology and Geophysics at the University of Wisconsin-Mad-
ison. She received a B.A. in geology from Yale University in
1976, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in Applied Earth Sciences from
Stanford University in 1985 and 1987. During her graduate
work, she was also employed as a hydrologist with the USGS.
She has consulting experience in water resources development
and aquifer restoration. Her research interests include fluid flow
in sedimentary basins, chemical evolution of groundwater, and
contaminant hydrogeology.
372 The Log Analyst
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227-240.
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Peter A. Drzewiecki received a B.S. in geology in 1989 from
the University of Notre Dame and an M.S. in geology at the
University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1992. His Masters re-
search focused on the diagenesis and geochemistry of the St.
Peter Sandstone in the Michigan Basin, and their implications
on the formation of abnormally pressured compartments. In
199 1 Peter won an SEPM Promising Young Geoscientist award.
He is currently working toward a Ph.D. in carbonate sedimen-
tology at the University of Wisconsin.
Lisa D. Shepherd received a B.A. in geology in 1987 from
Carleton College in Northfield, MN. After completing her un-
dergraduate degree she was employed at the USGS in Menlo
Park, CA. Her projects included a geothermal study in the Or-
egon Cascades and a subsidence study in the Sacramento-San
Joaquin Delta. She is currently completing requirements for an
M.S. in geology with a concentration in hydrogeology at the
University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her current research in-
volves the study of small-scale porosity and textural variations
in the St. Peter Sandstone in the Michigan Basin in order to
characterize the heterogeneity of low-permeability seals.
July-AuguSt, 1992