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The rapid rise of reservoir geophysics
WAYNE D. PENNINGTON, Michigan Technological University, Houghton, USA
I
n 1980 and again in 1985, on the occasions of the 50th
anniversary of the Society of Exploration Geophysicists
and the 50th anniversary of publication of GEOPHYSICS, spe-
cial issues of that journal were published. In both those times,
as now, the science was flourishing. The science described in
those issues was directed toward exploration, but many of the
methods were to form the basis for a new application, here
called reservoir geophysics. In 1980, oil prices were at record
highs, and in 1985 they were about to plummet; at the time of
this writing, prices are again at local highs, accompanied by
a renewed enthusiasm for the sound application of the sci-
ence.
The acceptance of 3D seismology as a cost-effective tool
for reservoir management was the single most important
aspect in the growth of reservoir geophysics. As such, most
of the history of reservoir geophysics parallels the history of
3D seismology. On the other hand, a wide variety of different
techniques within specialty areas of geophysics was developed
simultaneously; although these are not as widespread or well-
known as 3D seismic, they are extremely valuable tools in the
arsenal of reservoir management.
This brief history first describes the evolution of the accep-
tance of 3D seismic techniques for reservoir management, and
then summarizes a number of other geophysical techniques
used for reservoir engineering purposes. Of course, any ret-
rospective is strongly colored by the personal experiences and
biases (whether or not they are recognized as such) of the
author, who assumes full responsibility for any errors, par-
ticularly errors of omission.
Defining reservoir geophysics. Reservoir geophysics can be
defined as the application of geophysical techniques within a known
hydrocarbon reservoir. This implies that at least one well has been
drilled into that reservoir, and may (or may not) be available
for geophysical applications. It is this access to wells and/or
to internal information about the reservoir that distinguishes
reservoir geophysics from exploration geophysics, as well as
the overall scale of the surveys. We can further subdivide
“reservoir geophysics” into “development” and “production”
geophysics, depending on the immediate application:
Development geophysics is applied to the initial efficient
development of a field, whereas production geophysics is
applied to the understanding of the field as it evolves during
production. (In some instances, authors may use the term
reservoir geophysics as a synonym for “time-lapse seismic.”
This usage should be discouraged; time-lapse seismic is sim-
ply one aspect of production geophysics.)
In 1980, the typical sequence of reservoir development fol-
lowed a “classical” flow of information from one specialty to
another, as shown in Figure 1.
In 1980, the flow of information was linear, from one per-
son (and specialty) to another. There was very little feedback
between, say, the engineers involved in development and the
geophysicists who may have been able to assist them.
This has changed, of course. In fact, the new edition of the
Petroleum Engineering Handbook, to be published by the Society
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Figure 1. Schematic workflow for the development of a petroleum reservoir,
circa 1980.
of Petroleum Engineers, will include a chapter on reservoir
geophysics, specifically to inform engineers of the assistance
that geophysicists can provide. While the transition from exclu-
sively exploration-oriented geophysics to reservoir geophysics
may seem fast and furious, concentrated in the 1990s, a more-
detailed reflection indicates that the movement had already
begun by the early 1980s, when several developments took
place in academia, industry, and the economy.
The academic role in developing reservoir geophysics. Three
key participants were:
1) By 1977, Amos Nur had founded the Rock Physics group
at Stanford, and was later rejoined by his former student,
Gary Mavko. An expansion into borehole geophysics in
1986 created SRB, the Stanford Rock Physics and Borehole
Geophysics Project. This group has done (and continues
to do) much to allow the interpretation of geophysical
data in terms of rock and fluid properties, and of stresses
around boreholes, both key applications of reservoir geo-
physics.
2) In 1982, M. Nafi Toksöz at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology founded the Earth Resources Laboratory,
which by 1984 included the Full-Waveform Acoustic
Logging Consortium under Arthur Cheng, and by 1985
the Reservoir Delineation Consortium under Roger
Turpening. Both these consortia actively developed and
tested new geophysical methods for the evaluation of
reservoir and nonreservoir rocks through borehole geo-
physical techniques.
3) In 1985, Tom Davis formed the Reservoir Characterization
Project at the Colorado School of Mines using multicom-
ponent (and, later, time-lapse) seismic studies in reser-
voirs to define internal attributes such as fracture density
and fluid content. This group is now on its tenth “phase,”
having studied at least seven different fields.
These and other groups in many different countries laid
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the foundation for much of the seismic work now included in proved to be extremely useful in the next stage—the acceptance
reservoir geophysics. Their timing was good for the science, of 3D seismic studies by the engineering community. (While 3D
although funding was always (and presumably continues to be) seismic methods were gaining the most popularity and atten-
a challenge. But the combination of new methods of seismic tion, there were significant advances in several other aspects of
acquisition and processing with new and evolving interpreta- reservoir geophysics, including borehole-based seismic, micro-
tional aspects of rock physics was key to the ease of industry gravity, electrical, electromagnetic, and passive seismic; these will
acceptance of the seismic aspects of reser- be discussed in a later section of this
voir geophysics. It was fortunate for the paper.)
industry at large that a few far-sighted The first 3D seismic surveys were per-
professionals within various companies formed as subjects of research and have
championed these and other consortia at been discussed in various reminiscences
a time when funding was scarce and the published in TLE’s “From the Other Side”
applications of the science were not column. Most geophysicists knew by the
always entirely apparent. late 1970s or early 1980s that 3D seismic
The education of geophysicists in uni- was technically feasible, and some dra-
versities continued during the low-hiring matic examples were shown at various
period of the mid-to-late 1980s, providing meetings, mostly directed toward enhanc-
a workforce for those companies that did ing exploration, rather than production
hire them. In part due to the poor job mar- (see, for example, the abstract describing
ket, most schools were training their stu- 3D seismic exploration in the Austin Chalk
dents broadly, without early specialization by Calcote and others in SEG’s 1982
into certain niches, allowing them breadth Expanded Abstracts). By 1983, the SEG
of choice in employment upon gradua- Annual Meeting and Expanded Abstracts
tion. This ran counter to the demands of included a session “Seismic 16” (available
some recruiters, who tended (and still for online browsing through the SEG
tend) to request students who were Digital Library) with seven papers pre-
trained in one specific software package sented on 3D seismic methods and case
or one highly specialized niche area, in histories. Of these, about half could be
order to fill a certain immediate need. The considered applicable to reservoir geo-
generalized backgrounds of many of these physics, and about half to exploration.
students served them and their companies One of the papers described the first time-
well when the discipline rapidly evolved, lapse seismic study reported in the liter-
and these new employees migrated into Figure 2. The growth of 3D seismic surveys in ature: “A study of fireflood efficiency”
interdisciplinary positions bridging geol- Shell (outside of North America), from the (Greaves and others, paper S16.1; also later
ogy, geophysics, and engineering. expanded SEG abstract published by Nestvold in published in GEOPHYSICS). A number of
1991.
presentations at the 1983 Annual Meeting
The oil and gas industry. In the 1980s, the big money was being (sessions Seismic 20 and Seismic 21) also described computer
put into exploration, not reservoir, geophysics. There was a techniques that allowed interpreters to manage and view 3D seis-
widespread conviction that the price of oil would never drop, mic data, a necessary feature for wide application, of course.
and that finding new oil was the best way to make money. But Although the value of 3D seismic for field development was
then, suddenly, the Ekofisk platform in the North Sea was recognized publicly as early as 1984 (“The value of 3D seismic
observed to be “sinking” due to subsidence associated with in field development” by Gaarentstroom, SPE 13049), an impor-
reservoir compaction. Understanding the interior of the reser- tant milestone occurred with the publication of “Modern tech-
voir was suddenly a multibillion dollar question, at least for one nology in an old area: Bay Marchand revisited” by Abriel and
company, and all large oil companies became aware of their lim- others (first, as an abstract, RES 2.7 in 1990, then as a paper in
ited knowledge of reservoir-rock dynamics. Many geophysi- TLE in 1991). In this study, the Chevron team demonstrated that
cists had been schooled in earthquake seismology, and the 3D seismic studies and interpretation applied to a field—one that
transition to reservoir mechanics was natural. As it turned out, had been under production since 1949 and in decline since the
petroleum engineers also needed input for well-completion early 1970s—resulted in nearly doubling the daily production
designs, and this was becoming available through full-waveform and clearly demonstrating that reservoir geophysics was a cost-
acoustic logging. Once again, the classical earthquake training effective tool for the management of producing assets.
of many industry geophysicists made them well-suited for But the real confirmation that the industry was going to
understanding the normal-mode propagation of waves in the adopt the new technology and apply it to reservoir develop-
borehole (compared with the ray-theoretical approximations ment and production arrived in 1991 when Shell described its
suitable for most surface reflection studies) and the strength of experiences with 3D seismic. Figure 2 is from Nestvold’s “3D
rock and stresses in the formations—these values were needed Seismic: is the promise fulfilled?” SEG Expanded Abstract which
by engineers working on hydraulic-fracture design, predictions stated that “... it is recognized that 3D is a powerful tool for
of wellbore stability, and simulation studies incorporating the appraising a field and for providing valuable input into the
compressibility of the reservoir rock. development plan itself.” It was inferred that Shell would
Many engineers and geophysicists developed good work- conduct 3D seismic surveys over every major asset, as well as
ing relationships within their companies as a result of these being used earlier in the exploration process. This caught the
mutual interests and capabilities, and each learned the advan- attention of the managements of most oil companies, and geo-
tages the other could bring to their work. These relationships physicists were finally brought into the discussion of reser-

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Figure 3. Comparison of the growth in 3D seismic surveys (approximated
from Figure 2) and the price of oil (first-purchaser's cost, in constant year-
2000 dollars; from the Energy Information Agency, U.S. Department of
Energy).
voir engineering and production on a larger scale.
Most producing companies had, by this time (1991), devel-
oped some experience with 3D seismic methods, and con-
tractors were able to deliver the service worldwide. The
additional pieces required to make reservoir geophysics a
mainstream aspect of reservoir management were (1) confi-
dence of management in the geophysicists’ capability to under-
stand and appreciate reservoir engineering needs, and (2)
direct lines of communication between the geophysicists and
engineers. Fortunately, in many companies, these were already
in place as a result of their earlier experiences in geomechan-
ical and well-completion studies. Most companies were
already familiar with the appropriate technologies through
participation in academic consortia, if not through their own
efforts. The rest, as they say, is all in the details. Of course, the
details varied among companies and even among different
management groups. Some companies and managers made
opening of the lines of communication easy; others, no doubt,
made it difficult.
The gorilla in the room—economic issues. The development
of many of the techniques that ultimately found applications
in reservoir geophysics had begun when the price of oil was
very high, in the late 1970s and early 1980s. But then the price
of oil collapsed in 1986, and the attention of most oil compa-
nies and oil-service companies was directed to cutting costs
... to the bone. Exploration was a primary target of cost-cut-
ting, because of its long payback time. Reservoir geophysics
was seen by those geophysicists remaining in the business as
a possible avenue to continued relevance and employment.
Companies had to be convinced that there was actually an eco-
nomic benefit to be realized in applying reservoir geophysics.
The correlation between the drop in oil prices and the rise in
use of 3D seismic surveys (Figure 3) is only partially spuri-
ous, but the dramatic rise in seismic surveys applied for reser-
voir studies was no doubt accelerated by the need to develop
existing assets as budgets tightened.
How did this affect the geophysicists who were needed to
apply their science to the improved development of reservoirs?
A few scientists actually found positions as geophysicists
attached to engineering departments, but this was the excep-
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Figure 4: Price of oil (first-purchaser's cost, in constant year-2000 dollars;
from the Energy Information Agency), showing short-term volatility and
long-term stability from 1986 through 2003.
tion, rather than the rule. Strong economic pressures helped
drive geophysicists into making use of their talents in ways
which they had not previously envisioned, in areas such as
full-waveform acoustic logging, borehole stability, reservoir
geomechanics, and rock-physics integration with reservoir
simulation. These applications all became directly engaged in
what we now call reservoir geophysics.
As companies began to depend more on increasing pro-
ductivity from their existing assets and less from finding new
fields, the pressure also increased on reservoir engineers to
ensure that they made use of all the relevant data that could
be obtained. Their relationships with some geophysicists
allowed them to have confidence (although perhaps limited)
in the field in general, and most were open to considering the
use of geophysics in their reservoir evaluations.
Following the oil-price collapse of the 1980s, oil prices
remained more-or-less steady through 2003 (Figure 4),
although volatile in the short term. The groundwork for reser-
voir geophysics was laid during the price collapse of the 1980s.
The science matured during the postcollapse period of the
1990s, and this continues today. (Speculation about the rela-
tionship of reservoir geophysics with the oil-price run-up
under way in 2004-2005 is premature at this time, and will not
be attempted by this author!)
As reservoir geophysics matured, it became increasingly
“standard operating procedure” at most companies. With
increased scrutiny of asset statements, it is likely to become
more integrated with traditional reservoir management
schemes over time. Although hard figures are impossible to
come by, it may be that more financial and human resources
are being invested in reservoir geophysics than in exploration
geophysics at this time ... less than 20 years after the phrase
came to popular attention.
Specific aspects of reservoir geophysics. Reservoir geophysics
differs from exploration geophysics in three main areas: well
control, rock-physics control, and survey scope and design.
The targets of reservoir geophysical surveys are more clearly
identified, and the existence of at least one well means that
the surveys can be focused, calibrated to depth, and calibrated
for rock physics correlations. The availability of one or more

wells also opens up new geometrical options for the surveys.
As a result of these factors, reservoir geophysics has expanded
the application of 3D seismic and opened new opportunities
for borehole seismic and nonseismic techniques.
Many of these techniques are due largely to the tenacity
of a few dedicated visionaries of geophysics. Each specialty
has repeatedly been declared “dead” by practitioners and
management, only to resurface again with improved tech-
nology and resolution. The dedication of these people cannot
be overstated, and the field of reservoir geophysics owes them
their appreciation. Their funding sources varied, but included
their own personal credit, corporate support, venture capital,
and government funding. Government funding for the devel-
opment or improvement of many of these techniques was
often through the U.S. Department of Energy and its national
laboratories, in an effort to decrease the decline of US-based
petroleum resources (for author’s disclaimer, see acknowl-
edgments). Currently, research support in reservoir geophysics
is also provided through the European Union, reflecting the
importance of North Sea assets.
3D surface seismic has five main benefits:
• Attributes: While seismic attributes have become increas-
ingly important for exploration geophysics, they are de
rigueur for reservoir geophysics. Spatial variations in lithol-
ogy and fluid content are among the primary goals of reser-
voir geophysics, and these are typically established through
calibrated seismic attributes, including inversion results.
• Geostatistics: With well calibration comes the opportunity
to provide estimates of confidence in the results of corre-
lation of rock properties through (calibrated) rock-physics
relationships.
• Time-lapse seismic: The repeated surveying of a reservoir has
allowed changes in attributes to be related to changes in
reservoir properties due to production. Some changes are
the result of fluid substitutions, while others are due to pres-
sure changes, and still others may, in some unusual cir-
cumstances, be due to chemical and physical changes in
the reservoir matrix material.
• Ultrathin beds: As the targets become more focused, the abil-
ity to use the natural bandwidth within the seismic wavelet
increases. Commonly grouped under the label of “spectral
decomposition,” these methods exploit the highest-fre-
quency components of the wavelet and their tuning effects
in thin beds, rather than just the dominant frequency com-
ponent.
• Multicomponent seismology: The use of three-component
receivers, whether to record shear waves generated by a
specialized source or shear waves generated by conversion
upon reflection, has been demonstrated to enable imaging
beneath gas clouds that overlie some reservoirs and to
map fracture patterns and densities.
Borehole seismic has three primary functions:
• 3D VSPs: Getting either the receiver or the source closer to
the imaging target (and below the weathered layer) results
in a much higher-resolution image. Placement of a string
of seismic receivers in the borehole (vertical seismic pro-
filing or VSP) or a source in the borehole (reverse VSP)
accomplishes this, and allows for 3D imaging if the sur-
face components (sources for VSP and receivers for reverse
VSP) occupy appropriate large swaths of the surface.
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Development of extremely high-quality multichannel
receiver strings has made the service affordable by mini-
mizing acquisition time, which often requires loss of pro-
duction.
• Crosswell seismic imaging: The deployment of a string of
receivers in one well, and a source in another well, allows
the imaging of the plane between the two wells. The tim-
ing of the first arrivals allows a 2D image of interval veloc-
ities to be obtained as a velocity tomogram, and the
reflected events can then be migrated into proper positions
for a crosswell reflection image. The primary advantage
comes from a tremendous increase in resolution, often
exceeding a full order of magnitude improvement over the
surface data in the same area.
• Passive seismic monitoring: Some reservoir management
activities result in microseismic (and occasionally macro-
seismic) activity—small earthquakes—usually not
detectable at the surface of the earth. Deployment of sen-
sors in boreholes has allowed detection of these events.
When the seismic events that accompany stimulation for
hydraulic fracturing are located, the result is a temporally
changing map of the fracture during its creation. The map-
ping of events from other reservoir practices (usually,
although not always, injection) can also be accomplished,
although the relationship of these events to information that
is deemed useful to the improvement of reservoir perfor-
mance is not always apparent. While hydraulic-fracture
monitoring services can be considered “routine” by reser-
voir-geophysics standards, the application of other micro-
seismic services is still developing.
Electrical and electromagnetic surveys. The single most sig-
nificant physical property that distinguishes hydrocarbons
from brine is resistivity—hydrocarbons are virtually insula-
tors while brine is an excellent conductor. The differences can
be orders of magnitude (compare this with the fractional dif-
ferences of seismic properties), and mapping of reservoir flu-
ids from electrical and electromagnetic should be easy, it seems.
The problems with using these techniques are associated with
their inherent poor resolution (they should be considered dis-
persive, with essentially very large wavelengths) and the
prevalence of steel-cased wells in oil fields. Still, amazing
progress has been made, and, while not quite routine, time-
lapse electromagnetic surveys of reservoirs are now possible,
and case histories have been published. This area can be
expected to continue to improve in capability and availabil-
ity in the future, as improvements continue to be made and
case studies conducted.
The role of SEG. SEG promotes the advancement of the science
of geophysics and the ethical practice of applied geophysics. It
is strongly driven by the desires and needs of its membership.
But the word “exploration” is in its name. In the 1980s, a small
group of geophysicists decided that the overwhelming atten-
tion paid to exploration geophysics was resulting in the neglect
of geophysics applied to reservoir development and production,
and they formed a new committee, called the Development and
Production Committee, to address their needs. (This is how
things work in SEG. If there is a need for something, a group
can be formed to address it. It is a highly democratic institu-
tion.) This committee rapidly grew in size to more than 200 mem-
bers, almost all of whom were active in one form or another. It
initiated the “Development and Production Forum” (D&P
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Forum) in 1991, where attendees were united by common goals,

rather than common technologies. In this sense it was remark-
ably unique and beneficial—the participants in these week-long
meetings (held at resort locations) included geophysicists, geol-
ogists, engineers, and occasionally management. They were vir-
tually forced to sit through presentations and discussions
involving technologies with which they were not necessarily very
familiar, because there were no alternative sessions (other than
truancy, which was frowned upon). The effect was a tremen-
dous cross-fertilization of ideas and expertise. For example, the
electromagnetic researchers learned how to present results in
ways that reservoir engineers could see a benefit. Seismologists
learned about the problems facing the engineering community,
and found out that these were not always the same as the “prob-
lems” that the geophysicists had been working on. And so on.
Most meetings were highly successful, although some did not
break even financially, causing a strain on the concept of dedi-
cated small meetings sponsored by the larger society.
A brief timeline drawn from session titles of SEG Annual
Meetings and special sections of TLE shows a number of
accomplishments (see box, right).

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There were times that the D&P Committee recommended
that the SEG Executive Committee change the name of SEG to
something more encompassing (my personal favorite is SEG:
the Society of Extraordinary Geophysicists—where we are all
above average). This proposal was usually met with disdain, but
occasionally good-natured laughter. The D&P Committee no
longer feels the need to exert its influence in these matters.
Instead, the question presently facing the group is this: Now that
development and production geophysics has become a major
force—perhaps the major force—in petroleum geophysics, is
there still a need for such a committee? Should the committee
“declare victory and go home”? We are nearly all reservoir geo-
physicists now.
Suggested reading. The best contemporary accounts of the devel-
opment of reservoir geophysics can be found in the annual special
sections of TLE from 1992 through 2004. The journal is available for
browsing through the SEG Digital Library (http://segdl.org/). Some
readers may be interested in comparing the reflections made in this
paper with the predictions made by Gordon Greve in “Geoscience
in reservoir development—a sleeping giant” (TLE, 1992). @75
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Acknowledgments: The author gratefully acknowledges all the people who
worked on the D&P Committee through the years, and who actively pro-
moted the discipline of reservoir geophysics. Each person’s recounting of the
historic record will vary, and this article presents just one view. Preparation
of this manuscript was supported by project DE-FC26-04NT15508 from
the U.S. Department of Energy, Fossil Energy Program, through the Tulsa
office of the National Energy Technology Laboratory with Purna Halder as
program manager. The views and opinions of the author expressed herein
do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or
any agency thereof.
About the author: Wayne Pennington has degrees in geology and geophysics
from Princeton, Cornell, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His
career has been divided between academic and industry employers and he
is currently a professor of geophysical engineering and department chair at
Michigan Technological University. He was an early advocate of reservoir
geophysics and chaired the 1992 D&P Forum on Monitoring Reservoir
Changes Over Time. Pennington was guest editor for several TLE special
sections on development and production geophysics and wrote the reservoir
geophysics chapter in the new Petroleum Engineering Handbook (soon
to be published by SPE).
Examples of typical advertisements published
in GEOPHYSICS during the 1940s.
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