Page 312 - Geology and Geochemistry of Oil and Gas

ALGORITHM OF ACCELERATED EXPLORATION 273
11.4. ALGORITHM OF ACCELERATED EXPLORATION FOR HYDROCARBON
ACCUMULATIONS
The progress in the oil and gas industry is related closely to the acceleration of
discovery rates, exploration, development, and production of hydrocarbon resources.
This activity must be based on scientific information, which helps to predict subsurface
conditions and properties of the oil- and gas-bearing formations. The use of math-
ematical methods and computers increase the scope of problems that can be solved on
the basis of integrated geological, geophysical, geochemical, engineering, and com-
mercial information. Mathematical methods using computer-aided processing of the
available information accelerate the process of regional and local prediction of oil and
gas potential and increase the reliability of geologic forecast, that, in general, increases
the commercial and geologic efficiency of exploration, development, and production
of oil and gas fields.
Exploration of mineral resources in spite of its commercial content and significant
spending of time and investment may be considered as an actual industrial exper-
iment resulted in changing the a priori probability of mineral deposit discovery.
Exploration being essentially an informational process is profitably employed
the information input, storage, and processing procedures beginning with exper-
iment design (exploration operations including geophysical surveys and drilling the
prospecting and exploratory wells) and ending with computerized geological–
geophysical mapping, forecasting of exploration results, mineral resource assess-
ment, and field-development engineering. Utilization of mathematical methods is the
prolongation of exploration activity and is an effective factor of exploration accel-
eration. In the harsh and severe ambient and subsurface environments and under
complex and rigorous technical, engineering, organizational, and financial conditions,
such an approach increases the commercial efficiency of the mineral resources dis-
covery, assessment, and utilization, as well as subsurface protection and conservation.
Such situations generally occur while prospecting and exploring the sedimentary ba-
sins at great depths or while working in the offshore areas characterized by the scarce
information on the reservoir geometry, composition, and type of fluid saturation.
To resolve this problem, the method of accelerated exploration and commercial
estimation of hydrocarbon resources was proposed by Buryakovsky et al. (1990).
This method resulted in trap identification and mapping, subdivision of stratigraphic
sequences, reservoir delineation and structural description, reservoir rock and for-
mation of fluid properties assessment, and estimation of initial in-place and recov-
erable hydrocarbon reserves.

CONCLUDING REMARKS
The oil and gas generation and accumulation processes are occurring (and oc-
curred) in all sedimentary basins. The formation and preservation of hydrocarbon
accumulations, however, required favorable environments.
The development of concepts of oil and gas generation continuously expanded
with time. Instead of individual organic substances, the source organic matter is now