MILAN 2020: THE 5TH EAGE ROCK PHYSICS WORKSHOP

by | Feb 26, 2020 | Conferences

The 5th EAGE Rock Physics Workshop held in Milano, 10-12.02.20, hosted a diverse audience of some 60 attendees from industry, service companies and academia.

The three-day event featured six Sessions for papers, two for posters and three key note speakers.

The Workshop format enables excellent interaction and common ground sharing among the attendance, given the group discussions following each presentation.

Some key remarks are summarized here below:

Ran Bachrach, Schulmberger, “Rock Physics directions in the age of the Big Data and digital technology”. Following Ran’s definition, Rock Physics uses physical understanding, formulated in mathematical manner, for the prediction of various material properties. Models approaches can be theoretical, phenomenological or empirical and each one is related to a different form of uncertainty. Scale is another dimension, since properties can be considered at micro, meso and macro scales in Rock Physics. The new factors introduced by digital transformation are basically the large accessible amount of power, the possibility of collaborative research in joint industry projects, the free access to high level tools, the automated processing and interpretation.

Per Avseth, Dig Science, in his “4D Rock Physics Templates constrained by burial history” assessed how the volume of cement, related to burial history, drastically affects both the fluid and pressure sensitivities and is then of paramount importance in discriminating good to poor 4D candidates. To this regard, he especially stressed the importance of assessing the transition zone between the domains of mechanical and chemical compaction in order to quantify the amount of cementation. Injectite AVO signature is also related to a peculiar burial history and may lead to pitfalls in amplitude interpretation.

Jack Dvorkin (KFUPM, King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, Saudi Arabia) lead the audience towards the unconventional world, speaking about “Rock Physics of Unconventional shale: wireline, data, theory and applications”. A Rock Physics model was proposed to derive elastic properties through the images of drill cuttings in wells where other types of measurements are hardly attainable.

A case history on that was also proposed by CGG’s Fabien Allo, where elastic pseudo-logs were generated after cuttings analysis of horizontal wells.

It was widely acknowledged during the discussions that less separation between Quantitative Interpretation and general image is the way forward, thus leading to a reduction of decision times. A counterpart to this was indicated in the risk of loss of expertise in the industry due to the automated “push button” computation technologies.

Rock Physics is a multidisciplinary discipline that can be successfully applied at different scales, ranging from academia to industry approaches, albeit sometimes with different uncertainties, scope and time requirements. The workshop successfully gathered people from these different worlds assessing a common background and language, as well as also offering an excellent networking opportunity.

Eni contribution included four papers in three different sessions and a chaired session, listed below in bold together with notes on keynote talks.

Session 2: Quantitative Seismic Interpretation & Uncertainty:

Mind the Gap Between Petrophysics and Rock Physics: Petro-Elastic Facies for Driving Reservoir Modeling – G. Carrasquero, M. Fervari, R. L. Tagliamonte, C. Tarchiani – Eni

Application of Data-Driven Rock Physics Trends for Prospect De-risking: From Basin Scale Analysis to Reservoir Discovery – G. Carrasquero, A. Amato Del Monte, F. Luoni – Eni

Chairman di sessione: B. Ciurlo (Eni), R. Saberi (CGG)

Session 4: EOR and Time-Lapse Rock Physics:

Time-lapse Rock Physics from Well to Reservoir Scale: An Example from an EOR Field – D. Mastellone, C, Rizzetto – Eni

Session 5. Rock Physics Modelling:

A Rock Physics Workflow to Simulate Matrix Mineralogy Effects on AVO Models – C. Panzeri, B. Ciurlo, F. de Finis – Eni

Since 1989 in Agip then Eni G&G with focus on Geophysics; Geophysical advisor for Enipetroleum in New Orleans (US) 2008-2010; Knowledge Owner for Eni since 2015, Area Knowledge Coordinator for Geophysics since 2021

Geophysicist, Eni S.p.A.