Investigating the Detectability of Gas Sands Offshore South Africa by Means of AVO Modeling

P184 INVESTIGATING THE DETECTABILITY OF GAS SANDS OFFSHORE SOUTH AFRICA BY MEANS OF AVO MODELING JÜRGEN HOFFMANN 1 and RAYMOND DURKAN 2 Introduction 1 In November 2001 Sasol Petroleum International concluded a production sharing agreement for South African Block 3A/4A located in the Orange Basin off the western coast of that country. Several unsuccessful wells had been drilled in the area in the 1970’s and 1980’s with failures being due primarily to a lack of structural closure and/or severe reservoir diagenesis. However a well in an adjacent block tested stratigraphically trapped gas at high flow rates in relatively thin Albian