Creation and Analysis of Common Risk Segment Maps Using ArcGIS Integrating Global, Regional and Local Data to High-grade Exploration

The use of ArcGIS has enabled increasingly complex and diverse exploration data sets to be amalgamated, integrated and assessed in a user-friendly and relatively inexpensive environment. The Tellus™ global play fairways and petroleum systems database provides a unique platform for analysis of past exploration success and analysis of the future hydrocarbon potential of individual plays and stacked plays in single basins and across geographical regions. Common risk segment (CRS) maps for the main petroleum plays in a number of basins across the globe have been created by quantifying exploration risk for the Reservoir, Hydrocarbon Charge, Trap and Seal and Timing and hydrocarbon preservation: In addition to the geological issues outlined above, the exploration of a play or series of stacked plays in a basin or region are also at the mercy of geopolitical issues in the form of government policy (licensing rounds and available acreage), oil prices and exploration budgets. The spatial development of hydrocarbon discoveries in the basin (stacked plays) or in individual plays can be plotted using a simple algorithm in ArcGIS to display the fields discovered by decade or on smaller, user-defined time intervals.