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Seismic Modeling and Imaging Using Wave

Theory for Fault and Fracture Identification

Conference Paper · March 2016

DOI: 10.4043/26587-MS

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OTC-26587-MS

Seismic Modeling and Imaging Using Wave Theory for Fault and Fracture
Identification
Bashir Yasir, Deva Prasad Ghosh, Seyed Yaser Moussavi Alashloo, and Chow Weng Sum, Universiti Teknologi
PETRONAS

Copyright 2016, Offshore Technology Conference

This paper was prepared for presentation at the Offshore Technology Conference Asia held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 22–25 March 2016.

This paper was selected for presentation by an OTC program committee following review of information contained in an abstract submitted by the author(s). Contents
of the paper have not been reviewed by the Offshore Technology Conference and are subject to correction by the author(s). The material does not necessarily reflect
any position of the Offshore Technology Conference, its officers, or members. Electronic reproduction, distribution, or storage of any part of this paper without the
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Abstract
Illumination of discrete transmissivity structures such as faults or fracture zones prior to exploration offers
substantial benefits for all phases of field development. We have established a new way of seismic
imaging through diffractions study using reflection seismology. A subsurface geological model is
developed for highly productive field located in southern part of Malay Basin. Finite difference modeling
is used for generating synthetic seismic data. Both velocity and density model is used for explanation of
wave propagation intimate the subruface from side to side one-way and two-wave wave propogation.
One–way wave equation migration methods are tested to image the faults in synthetic seismic section of
Malay Basin and they are able to image the complex structure such as faults and fracture prevailing in the
model.

Introduction
The Malay Basin is a mature Tertiary extensional basin with a later inversion regime in the Late
Miocence. The general geology is simple ⬙layer cake⬙ seismically, with compressive anticlinal inversion
structures (Ghosh, Sajid, Ibrahim, & Viratno, 2014). Highly tectonic activity is a cause of compressional
structure like complex faulting with steep dips and overthrust.
The spectral practices of migration are well known to have a wavefield extrapolation achieved in the
Fourier domain (frequency and wave number)(Santos, da Cruz Pestana, & Aldunate, 2015). Seismic data
is recorded in the space-time domain (x-t) and transformed into the Fourier domain (k-w) are undergoing
converted namesake. The algorithms which belong to the catagories of fundamental migration are Stolt
(Stolt, 1978), Phase Shift (J Gazdag, 1978), Split Step (Freire, 1988), Phase Shift Plus Interpolation -PSPI
(Jeno Gazdag & Sguazzero, 1984) and the Fourier Finite Difference –FFD (Ristow & Rühl, 1994). We
describe the migration in form of wave equation in Figure 1 that is enlightenment of all migration
algorithms which are being rummage-sale by the processors in all over the world.
The methods mentioned above are reasonably fast, they implement the wavefield extrapolation based
on the derivative of the fourier transform and properties of the translation in time(Santos et al., 2015).
However, every algorithm has some inadequacies by way of its own, which prevent the imaging of high
slope structures, whose reflections have trajectories with reflection on more than one interface.
2 OTC-26587-MS

Figure 1—Description of variouse types of migration algorithm on the basis of wave equation technique.

Methodology

Goelogical Model
The geological model is taken from one of fields in Malay Basin. The model comprises four superimposed
layers of different velocity, with majour faulting because of uplifting of the sublayered. The synthetic
seismic data of this model was obtained from a well known seismic modeling technique.

Figure 2—A geological model from Malay Basin (Kadir, 2010).

Figure 3—Geological model used in study, representing the highly dipping faults and an anticlinal structure in deeper section.
OTC-26587-MS 3

Finit Difference Modeling

Finite difference methods (FDM) have been widely used in seismic modeling and migration. One of the
disavantages of FDMs is stumpy computational cost. The FD approximations give a numerical solution
of partial differential equation. The precision of this solution is reliant on the order of approximation.
Eventually, all the finite difference methods are based on Taylor Series approximation (Scales, 1995).
Therefore, a discrete version of wave equation is obtained that includes the initial situation or preliminary
point, where the wave field starts propagate, is requied.
In the geophysical world, the constant density acoustic wave equation is used widespread because of
its simplicity for homogeneus medium. 2D wave equation for acoustic case is defined by the equation
given below
(1)

Here for modeling process, we have velocity and density as input, and the output is the seismic traces,
for inversion case, input is seismic traces and output is the structural image. These both quantities are
required to be calculated. These quantities are as below (Bleistein, 1986)

␶ Travel time
␤ Incident angle from source or receiver,
␴ Running ray parameter,
⭸␤/⭸␹ Geometrical spreading parameter.

For each source or receiver, the above quantities satisfy the following equation(Bleistein, 1986):
(2)

(3)

(4)

where ␮(x, z) is the velocity and

(5)

Equations (2) and (3) are derived by Pusey and Vidale (1991). Equation (4) is derived from equation
(2).
The modeling was conducted in a grid of 10x2 m (dx⫽10, dz⫽2) and with Ricker wavelet which is
defined by its dominant frequency 50 Hz. These constraints were respectable enough to avoid numerical
dispersion and unpredictability in finit difference modeling. The modeling was preformed by ignoring
multiples and absorption edge in the physical limit of the model.
The modeling has been done using the same model with different density and velocity parameters.
4 OTC-26587-MS

Figure 4 —(a) Zero-offset synthetic seismic section using finint difference modelling, alterations in parameters of velocity, and (b) a
constant velocity zero-offset gathers.

Discussion and Obtained Results

The extrapolation of the Wavefield in the frequency domain is computationally highly efficient and
numerically stable, which are contributing to make the use of spectral techniques attractive in the
migration of seismic data(Santos et al., 2015). However, ignoring the downgoing wavefield, the most
important limitation in the imaging of high dipping structures are imposed to these algorithms. The
result obtained with the imaging of data from the above geological faulted model, clearly demon-
strates the limitation of conventional spectral techiques imaging, and competency of the two-way
wave migration.
The comparision of dissimilar wave equation migration techniques reveals data with similar structural
imaging, however, these techniques are considered that using the same processing capability and faster
implementation provides the optimum imaging results.
One-way-FK-Reverse-Time migration can be distributed into FK, Phase shift methods, and phase shift
plus interpolation method.
We started the soulution for the scaler wave equation for the zero-offset wavefield. If the medium
velocity is constant, migration can be expressed as direct mapping form temporal frequency w to vertical
wavenumber kz. In mid 1970’s, R. H. Stolt invented what has become known as stolt or FK migration.
(6)

(7)

where P (kx, z⫽0, ␻) is zero-offset section and P (kx, kz, t⫽0) is the migrated section in the
frequency-wavenumber domain.
OTC-26587-MS 5

Figure 5—(a) A zero-offset section that contains a set of faults and reflectors, and (b) F-k spectrums of unmigrated data, high amplitude
is in the central part and low amplitudes away form the sides.

Figure 6 —(a) migrated data using stolt constant velocity algorithm, and (b) f-k spectrum of the migrated data which shows low
amplitude is distributed on the true position of reflection.

Phase shift method was based purely on reverse-time modeling approach. In this technique, the
approach of constant velocity criteria was successfully removed which was imposed by the Stolt
method. It was also the earliest and, conceivably until very recently, the only method that was
accomplished of imaging steeply dipping reflectors. The phase shift approach was developed by Jeno
Gazdag shortly after the Stolt method appeared (J Gazdag, 1978). The starting PDE is the Helmholtz
equation given by
(8)

Since the starting exploding refelction is at t⫽0 then the location of the reflector is given by inverse
transforming the solution in kx and w and evaluating at t⫽0:
(9)

The above condition of r(x, z) ⫽p(x, z, t⫽0) is known as the zero-offset migration imaging condition.
Phase Shift Plus Interpolation –PSPI method is a phase-shift like method for dealing with strong lateral
velocity variation (Jeno Gazdag & Sguazzero, 1984). The intial impression of PSPI is to familiarize
serveral reference velocities to describe the lateral velocity in each extrapolation step, and obtain the
multi-reference wavefields in the f-k domain. Based on the relationship of the local velocity and reference
6 OTC-26587-MS

velocity, the finial migration results are obtained by interpolating the reference wavefiels in the f-k
domain. The basic formulas are:
(10)

and
(11)

where k’z is obtained using the reference velocity. After the reference wavefield is Fourier-transformed
back to the frequency-space domain, the final migration result is obtained by linear interpolation(Jeno
Gazdag & Sguazzero, 1984).
These all well known one-way wave equation imaging algorithms are applied to the data for obtaining
the optimum result. Figure 7 is the comparisons of above describe migration methods. In which we can
observe the diffracted energy is stacked at the apex of hyperbola and fault can be interpret very clearly.
Figure 8 is an output of Fourier transform with comparison of un-Imaged (Figure 8a) with Imaged data
(Figure 8b). Here we can see amplitude because of diffraction energy was also removed and distraction
of data is visible clearly.

Figure 7—Comparision of migration algorithm operators. (a) Gazdag (b) Phase Shift and (c) Stolt migration.
 OTC-26587-MS 7

Figure 8 —Amplitude spectrum display of the data after Fourier transform. (a) Zero-offset data, and (b) migrated data.

Conclusions
Seismic modeling and imaging are forming an important role in competence to interpreate the subsurface
structure like fault, fractures and small but important events for hydrocarbon prospect evaluation. In this
paper, we have developed a part of geological model from Malay Basin, which contains the steeply
dipping faulted and fractured inside metasediment basement. Diverse wave equation techniques are
applied to the synthetic data for imaging faults. We have analyzed on one-way wave equation migration
using F-K, PS, and Gazdaz migration. Results form the diverse algorithms are providing the optimum
results to image the faults and fracture indicators, but for the whole reflection due to fault are not imaged
properly. After the application of Fourier transform, when the data is converted into frequency domain
from time domain. We have analyzed the amplitude spectruam and a phas spectrum, its demostate the
amplitude on the faults plane is summed as an indentificator of fault plane.
Another way is pertinent for identification of faults using diffraction studies. Diffraction hyperbolas
which are producing because of abrupt change of velocity or density are sepreated using FK analysis by
filtering the dominance frequency at the minimum wave number. Then using the diffraction stack
migration for the hyperbolas we can image the faults and fractures.

Acknowledgement
We are thankful to Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS (UTP) and the Centre of Seismic Imaging (CSI) for
providing facilities of this research. I would like to thanks Petroleum Research Fund (PRF) for financial
support. In this work I have used Seismic Unix from CSM.

References
Bleistein, N. (1986). Two-And-One-Half Dimensional In-Plane Wave Propagation*. Geophysical Prospecting, 34 (5),
686 –703. http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2478.1986.tb00488.x
Freire, R. M. L. (1988). Migraçã o por mudança de fase em duas etapas. Migraçã o Por Mudança de Fase Em Duas
Etapas.
Gazdag, J. (1978). Wave equation migration with the phase-shift method: Geophysic, 43, 1342–1351.
Gazdag, J., & Sguazzero, P. (1984). Migration of seismic data by phase shift plus interpolation. Geophysics, 49 (2),
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Ghosh, D., Sajid, M., Ibrahim, N. A., & Viratno, B. (2014). Seismic attributes add a new dimension to prospect evaluation
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One-Way Wave Equation Migration Techniques. Revista Brasileira de Geofísica, 33 (1), 71–78.
Scales, J. A. (1995). Theory of seismic imaging (Vol. 2). Springer-Verlag Berlin.
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