Visualization and Volume Interpretation Change the Game. Now How Do We Change the Team

Bradford, Kevin J.¹, Peter U. Diebold² (1) Shell International Exploration and Production, Inc, Houston, Albania (2) Shell International Exploration and Production, Inc, Houston, TX

The pressure on reserves replacement dominates today's business climate. In a resource-constrained environment, the tendency is to get the job done with less regard to improving workflow efficiencies. The motivation for delivering workflow efficiencies has not been apparent as major oil and gas companies have not been aligned culturally or organizationally to take advantage of a non-silo approach.

3D Visualization and volume-interpretation techniques have been promoted for several years to improve productivity and reduce cycle time. The tools by themselves however can never improve the decision making process without a fundamental shift in the way interdisciplinary teams work. There have been many discussions on what is visualization. For many years, these discussions had centered on hardware and software. In more recent years the workflow has reentered the discussion. However, for a truly synoptic view of the subsurface model, people are the key component. From seismic interpreter to geologic modeler, goals must be aligned so that a common view of the data brings new insights.

The much-lauded increase in compute power through multi-core, multi processor systems has arrived. Flexible platform architectures enable best of class applications to work together. Change management processes must realize the benefits of volume interpretation techniques by allowing a break from the status quo. Courage and confidence are required to allow team members to investigate the data. As long as 2D maps are seen as the final product of the interpretation process, business value will not be reached. Only when structurally consistent frameworks in a model centric environment are required will the cultural swing begin to fulfill the promise of 3D visualization and volume interpretation.

References:

Interpretation Methodologies Utilizing 3-D Visualization Tools: Jansen, Ed; Bradford, Kevin; 2004, AAPG International Conference

Value in Visualization; Stark, Tracey; AAPG Explorer 2004

Virtual Reality, Actually: Leslie, R; 2004 AAPG International Conference