In the slim-margin world of unconventional resourceplays, optimization is critical. With operators investingroughly US $150 billion to drill and complete wells thisyear, according to “Drilling Contractor,” operators facethe realization that as many as one-quarter of their frac-turing jobs will fail to meet performance objectives. Thisrisk is an expensive lesson for an industry that pridesitself on effective asset management.Lower field performance is more than a suboptimal

return on opex and capex. It highlights significant gapsin the ability of some oil companies to answer key ques-tions about their reservoirs. E&P companies operatingonshore in the US plan to drill approximately 35,000wells this year, according to Simmons & Co., with up to 40 stages per well. “With an average cost per stage of $150,000 to

$200,000, technology that eliminates the need for just10% of those stages would save the industry $630 millionin one year,” Jorge Machnizh, SIGMA3 CEO, said. “We arehelping clients leverage imaging and fracturing technolo-gies to capture these savings and simultaneously achievegreater levels of EUR [estimated ultimate recovery] fortheir wells.”

Integrated solutions can give companies confidenceabout where to drill, where and how to fracture andcomplete, and where to invest next by helping addresscritical questions such as:• What areas will be the most productive and profitable?• How do we drill the fewest wells and leverage theirtrajectories to make the most of reservoir properties,including geomechanical attributes such as brittle-ness and features like natural fractures?• How do we design wells that best connect naturaland induced fractures with the least number ofhydrofrac stages? and• What hydrofracturing engineering and completiontechniques will maximize our production and returnon investment? Key to this effort is a real-time dynamic earth modeling

(RTDM) workflow that integrates real-time completionsdata and microseismic event visualization in tandem withgeologic modeling and field-scale reservoir property pre-dictions to optimize drilling and completion programs(Figure 1). “Geoengineering workflows must be tuned to inte-

grate and interpret large volumes of valuable data fromthe field and to deliver operationally useful feedback ina meaningful timeframe,” Machnizh said. “Optimal per-formance can only be achieved through the use of anintegrated subsurface model that can be updated just intime to enable critical decision-making. RTDM work-flows combine real-time field data with 3-D reservoirmodeling and visualization. They provide users withaccess to predictive information about key operationalissues including geosteering, hazard avoidance, and fracstimulation performance.”

Value-driven results Engineers strive for optimization. Unfortunately, cur-rent industry tools make it difficult or impossible to ana-lyze the massive amounts and variety of data types thatimpact well performance and successful field manage-ment. SIGMA3 has created a single unified platform thatwas designed specifically for engineering collaboration. This platform facilitates collaboration between tradi-

tional silos. Silos impact organizations by preventingproper data management and communication between

June 2013 | EPmag.com

Integration leads to optimizationCollaboration between the disciplines of geoscience, engineering,

and real-time microseismic monitoring improves exploration success.

Gareth Block and Kevin McKenna, SIGMA³ Integrated Reservoir Solutions

FIGURE 1. CRYSTAL combines microseismic interpretation, hydrofrac

data, and geomodel predictions to enhance real-time decision-mak-

ing. (Images courtesy of Sigma3 Integrated Reservoir Solutions)

AS SEEN IN JUNE 2013

geoscientists and engineers (and even amongdifferent engineering teams). This can leadto project delays and lost opportunities. Toremove these barriers, Sigma3 combined soft-ware development tools with a cloud-basedarchitecture. With the platform’s focus onsimplicity, field engineers, asset managers,and geophysicists can perform quick evalua-tions of drilling, completion, and productiondata (Figure 2). And with a platform builtaround around the concept of real-time col-laboration, office- and field-based teams areable to share key insights and capture valuefrom every opportunity. The suite makes it easy to access, analyze,

and assimilate vast amounts of disconnected geoscienceand engineering data. The result is a toolkit built specifi-cally for unconventional shale resource developmentwith its requirements for real-time interactive decision-making and longer term analysis and optimization. AGIS interfaces directly with reservoir models, wellboreschematics, and microseismic data in the same workspace. Temporal data like net pressure or microseismicevents can be displayed in an intuitive way. And comple-tion designs can be corroborated using predictive dataanalytics from nearby wells.

Data integration SIGMA3 also is releasing its latest version of CRYSTAL,an expert-level platform for geophysicists and modelers.This provides the tools necessary to convert 2-D and 3-Dseismic data into high-resolution reservoir models usefulfor field management. When 3-D seismic data are avail-able, the workflows provide valuable information aboutreservoir quality and hydrofracture effectiveness as wellas information about stratigraphy and reservoir architec-ture. When quality 3-D seismic data are not available,new time- and cost-efficient technologies such as bore-hole seismic imaging and wellbore trajectory imagingare able to provide high-resolution near-well images tosupport real-time operations. The platform allows users to perform detailed well ties

using highly deviated or horizontal wells, build complexstructural frameworks, calculate volumetric curvature toimage faults and fracture networks, and run stratigra-phy-constrained deterministic and stochastic inversionsto predict reservoir properties and hydrocarbon place-ment (Figure 3). Each of these technologies is linked toa common platform so that completion and drillingengineers, asset managers, geoscientists, and others canshare data in real time with full transparency.

Invest where it countsOil and gas companies cannot afford to operate in traditional silos. The only way to succeed in low-marginunconventional plays is to truly integrate geoscience andengineering teams. The use of innovative frac and comple-tions experience and sophisticated microseismic acquisi-tion, processing, and interpretation techniques, along withtrue collaboration, provide the bridge to taking things to anew level of accuracy and return on investment.

IMPROVING EXPLORATION SUCCESS

FIGURE 2. The map on the left shows cumulative Niobrara production, while the

map on the right shows the probability of 25,000 bbl cumulative.

FIGURE 3. The integration of ThinMAN inversion for resolution

enhancement with powerful volumetric curvature analysis pro-

vides enhanced detail of folding, faulting, and fracturing.

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