Oil Patch Bits: WesternGeco acquiring dual coil shooting survey

WesternGeco, a business segment of Schlumberger, said Oct. 14 that it has begun the acquisition of the Revolution multiclient survey. Revolution marks the first time that Dual Coil Shooting multivessel full-azimuth acquisition has been performed commercially in the industry worldwide.

Located in the East Breaks and Garden Banks areas of the Western Gulf of Mexico, the Revolution multiclient survey will provide full-azimuth coverage for more than 130 outer continental shelf blocks.

“We are encouraged by the initial images derived from Revolution, our first Dual Coil survey. The ultra long offsets combined with full-azimuth illumination enables significant imaging uplift in the Gulf of Mexico’s complex subsalt structures,” said Thomas Scoulios, North America region manager, WesternGeco. “We are pleased with the commitments from multiple underwriters who are helping to direct this project’s success.”

Building on multi- and wide-azimuth techniques, the FAZ Dual Coil Shooting is a new, advanced method of acquiring ultra long offset marine seismic data using four vessels following a circular path. This acquisition provides better target illumination in challenging environments by enabling greater azimuthal coverage and a higher signal-to-noise ratio. Dual Coil Shooting technology is possible due to the capabilities of the Q-Marine point-receiver seismic system.

WesternGeco will apply the latest seismic data processing techniques to this survey, including true-azimuth 3-D Generalized Surface Multiple Prediction and anisotropic reverse time migration.