Co-Authors: Andy Fryer, Les Nutt; VSP Consultants LLC

Does vertical seismic profiling (VSP) have value in today’s business environment? Of course, the answer is yes! The most valuable data from any VSP may be the ground-truth measurement of seismic travel times, which are useful in validating and calibrating seismic model building efforts. VSPs provide high resolution imaging for guiding sidetracks and horizontal wellbores. VSPs are highly repeatable, a significant benefit for time-lapse reservoir monitoring surveys. VSPs can be used to validate surface seismic fracture characterizations. These techniques require fit-for-purpose acquisition systems to minimize the cost while maximizing the value. The availability of optical fibers in many wells has spurred the development of Distributed Acoustic Sensing (DAS) as an alternative (or complement) to geophone VSPs. 

Wireline deployed geophones are the most common acquisition system. Where directionality and measurement of the full wavefield is important, clamped 3 component geophones are needed. Data quality is typically excellent, but the array length is limited. DAS records near-geophone quality VSP data at a much-reduced cost. The DAS fiber typically records over the whole length of the well. Both DAS and wireline downhole systems need proper survey design to be effective. 

This talk will illustrate some of the more common VSP techniques being used today. DAS and geophone VSP examples show that there is always a way to cost-effectively record VSPs and extract maximum geophysical value from them.

Speaker Biography: Allan Campbell, VSP Consultants LLC
Allan Campbell has been working as a Borehole Seismic consultant with VSP Consultants since 2016.  He provides borehole seismic training, project management and VSP processing to operators and service companies. 

Allan spent 25 years with Schlumberger, all in the borehole seismic industry. His experience ranges from field acquisition, to processing and interpretation of VSPs. He was involved in every kind of VSP project, including using borehole seismic data to validate surface seismic processing, using VSP to validate pore-pressure predictions, high resolution imaging to guide sidetracks, and using VSP in time-lapse monitoring of enhanced recovery and CO2 sequestration. 
Allan received his BSc in Geophysics from the university of Calgary in 1990.