Case Studies of Using Far and Ultra-Far Seismic Data in Deep-water Nigeria Erha North Field: Beauty and the Beast

This paper highlights the complexity and challenges associated with deep-water exploration and development in Nigeria. The Erha North field Reservoir-300 was discovered using the block-wide 2000 seismic survey. A shallow channel severely attenuated the seismic image at the reservoir level. A new 2005 seismic survey was shot perpendicular to the shallow channel and improved the imagibility of the reservoirs by undershooting the shallow channel. ExxonMobil’s Pre-migration Spectral Shaping (EM_PreSS) technique further enhanced the data quality. The EM_PreSS ultra-far 38-48° angle stack provided the best well tie in the Erha North Phase I development area. The significantly improved seismic data quality greatly increased interpretation confidence and impacted the business decision to not drill appraisal well Erha Far-East (EFE) and instead to drill the exploration well Erha North-East (ENE). The Erha NE prospect is located 7 km away from the center of the Erha North field, with the primary target in Reservoir-300. The seismic response at the up-dip of the prospect is similar to the hydrocarbon response observed at the Erha North field, but lacks conformance to structure - an expected DHI element. The original hole (OH) targeted an up-dip location and encountered multiple gas and oil sands, in both primary and secondary reservoirs. However, the primary target Reservoir-300 was penetrated with two separated thin gas-on-oil sands. No water sand was penetrated. A determination was made that such highly compartmentalized reservoir could not be developed economically. Down-dip from the Erha NE original hole discovery, a strong low-impedance amplitude anomaly was observed on the ultra-far (38-48°) angle stack. No other angle stack showed a similar strong low-impedance response and no other DHI attributes were observed. This amplitude response was neither similar to other known hydrocarbon responses nor to known water leg responses. Geophysical modeling results could not rule out the possibility of down-dip hydrocarbon presence by using reasonable rock properties assumptions. Given the high resource uncertainty, the operator determined it would be beneficial to test the down-dip location before Phase II development starts. The down-dip side-track (ST) well was drilled and penetrated a thick clean water-bearing sand. Post- drill modeling suggested that abnormally high anisotropy in the sand could be the cause of the ultra-far low impedance amplitude anomaly.