Estimating reservoir zone from seismic reflection data using maximum-likelihood sparse spike inversion technique: a case study from the Blackfoot field (Alberta, Canada)

Seismic inversion involves extracting qualitative as well as quantitative information from seismic reflection data that can be analyzed to enhance geological and geophysical interpretation which is more subtle in a traditional seismic data interpretation. Among many approaches that have been made to improve interpretation of post-stack seismic data, a great effort has been made to use maximum likelihood (ML), sparse spike inversion (SSI) along with multi-attribute analysis (MAA) aimed to increase the resolution power of interpreting seismic reflection data and mapping into the subsurface lithology. These methods are applied to the Blackfoot seismic reflection data to estimate reservoir. The methods were first applied to the composite trace close to well locations and were inverted for acoustic impedance (AI). The results depict that the inverted AI matches very well with the well log AI. The statistical analysis demonstrates good performance of the algorithm. Thereafter, the entire seismic section was inverted to acoustic impedance section. The analysis of the inverted impedance section shows an anomaly zone in between 1060 and 1075 ms time and characterize it as reservoir. Further, the multi-attribute analysis is performed to estimate porosity and density in the inter-well region. The inverted porosity section shows a high porosity anomaly and a low density anomaly in between 1060 and 1075 ms time intervals which corroborated well with the low impedance zone and confirm the presence of a reservoir.