2008 Joint Meeting of The Geological Society of America, Soil Science Society of America, American Society of Agronomy, Crop Science Society of America, Gulf Coast Association of Geological Societies with the Gulf Coast Section of SEPM

Paper No. 7
Presentation Time: 11:30 AM

Field Study of South Pass 60 Field - OCS: An Integrated Multidisciplinary Approach


DAVIS, Craig1, TUBB, John1, TRUSS Jr, Cecil H.1, OSTRANDER, Robert1, PRATOR III, M. Drayton2, JANIK, Gary3, LANGHETEE, Ed3, GIOVANNETTI, Dennis3 and BUCKERT, Steve4, (1)Inexs, 1980 Post Oak Blvd., Suite 2050, Houston, TX 77056, (2)Prator Bett, L.L.C, 712 Main Street, Suite 1830, Houston, TX 77002, (3)Dynamic Offshore Resources L.L.C, 1111 Bagby, Suite 505, Houston, TX 77002, (4)Petro-Hunt L.L.C, 16801 Greenspoint Park Dr., Suite 395, Houston, TX 77060, cdavis@inexs.com

Dynamic Offshore Resources (then SPN) acquired the north, west, and east flanks of forty year old South Pass 60 Field in 2004. The north area of the field has 121 wells which have a cumulative production of 48.5 MMBO and 77.5 BCFG. Nine horizons have produced with an additional four pay-zones unproduced.

The future successful development of the field by Dynamic depends upon a comprehensive process of carefully organizing the previous work, recreating complete wellbore utilization and correlation charts, and 3D seismic mapping to resolving the complex structure and stratigraphy to match the known production within each fault block and reservoir.

Unstable bottom conditions have dictated that platforms be set on top of the salt dome which has resulted in highly deviated long reach well bores that intersect bedding planes at very low angles making well log correlations between the 121 wells very difficult. Dynamic commissioned a field study in the north area with a goal of integrating well logs, paleontology, 3D seismic, and engineering data to identify and quantify new drill and sidetrack opportunities.

Measured Depth (MD) logs were digitized and used with 3D seismic depth maps to create True Vertical Thickness (TVT) logs. TVT factor and True Stratigaraphic Thickness (TST) were calculated. Arbitrary seismic lines were created along each deviated wellbore to correlate faulting and interpret horizons accurately.

This multidisciplinary field study has yielded many additional exploration and re-completion opportunities for Dynamic, and has resolved countless inconsistencies between production data and previous well correlations.