Sizing up seismic

Brian Anderson of SeaBird Exploration sits down with O&G to discuss exploration trends.

Tell us about SeaBird's seismic contracting business and how you are faring in the current market?
Brian Anderson. SeaBird, like the rest of the seismic industry, experienced a slow down through the soft market of 2009. At present, we have a reasonable backlog for all of our nine vessel fleet, with a good distribution both geographically and proprietary work versus multi-client surveys. What has been a pleasant surprise is the continued expansion of the global market for node seismic for detailed 4D or time lapse and reservoir development seismic data acquisition in deepwater obstructed oilfields. As a leader in this market, we see an exceedingly bright future for this business, and will be expanding our capabilities to take advantage of the growing interest in nodes seismic.

Can you describe how nodes have developed into a primary business line for SeaBird?
The result of over 20 years of development and testing, nodes seem to finally found a solid place in the development and production geophysics market. The early node designs were initially developed at Statoil. Statoil's spin-off, SeaBed Geophysical, was acquired by SeaBird in 2006. SeaBird Technologies AS has now produced 750 units, with an additional 1500 units planned for construction and deployment in 2010. SeaBird has completed successful surveys using nodes for Total, Pemex and BP and has a current survey underway at the Agbami Field in Nigeria for Chevron and their partners. We see an increasing demand for node seismic systems, unique in their ability to acquire high quality full fold full seismic coverage in obstructed producing fields, with more growth expected for this approach to reservoir seismic data acquisition.  

What improvements in the systems have been implemented?
Initial work in Angola was eventually successful, but the new systems had a few bugs to iron out, including ROVs and node handling systems. During the most recent work with the CASE Abyss nodes at the Atlantis Field, the nodes performed exceedingly well, with only an approximate 1.5 percent failure rate. The nodes have proven to be a robust and dependable recording system, even in harsh deepwater environments. Future improvements will include extended battery life, fast-track onboard data processing, and simultaneous shooting with multiple source vessels.

What do you see the market demand to be for node seismic in the future?
As previously stated, the current market demand for OBN seismic is expanding at an accelerated rate. A stationary, planted sensor has the advantages of higher data quality and four-component (pressure wave and converted wave data), which can be applied with greater success to seismic inversions for the determination of rock properties, oil-water contact mapping, pore pressure analysis, and more accurate drilling and recovery techniques. At present, a growing number of major oil companies are planning, operating, processing, or interpreting OBN data. The future for this technology and the companies that provide it is exceedingly bright.

Brian Anderson is VP of Marketing and Sales for SeaBird Exploration for Americas Operations. He holds a B.Sc. in Geological Oceanography and has had a 30-year career in exploration geophysics. He is a Director of the International Association of Geophysical Contractors (IAGC), and a member of SEG, AAPG, SPE, SEAPEX, PESGB, and AIPN.