Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
As I mentioned in the previous post on seismic inversion, using zero-phase seismic data as an input for inversion, is one of the most critical elements for accurate results. However, this brought up the question of “how bad is bad”, when it comes to phase-matching errors? So, to answer this question, I had an idea to test the sensitivity of inversion results based on the phase of the input data.
Below, is a series of inversion images which were produced from the same initial synthetic seismogram. However, prior to generating the inversion, I rotated the phase of the input data in the amount indicated at the bottom of each image—that is: 0, 45, 90, 180, 270, and 315 degrees.
See the larger Adobe Reader pdf file.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
For those who read my previous posting, “Making the Case for Synthetic Seismograms“, but didn’t currently have a program to generate your own synthetics, I thought that I would include a few links to the programs that I knew about. All of the programs listed below, except SMT’s SynPak, are stand-alone programs, or part of a group of software related to synthetics (log editing, AVO modeling, etc.)—at least that I could determine from their websites.
Please note that I have only used the first two programs in the list, and cannot recommend any of the remaining software, relative to how accurate they are, how well they perform, etc. The list is provided for your informa- tion, and convenience only.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
This plot illustrates a disturbing, long-term trend for the U.S., towards an increasing dependence on imported oil (includes crude oil, and natural gas liquids) to meet our current consumption levels of over 21 million barrels per day (over 892 million gallons)—more than it’s ever been.
Put another way, we currently consume over two decent-sized, domestic oil fields per day!! While consumption (purple graph) has been steadily increas- ing since a low in the early 1980’s, domestic production (blue graph) has been declining since the mid 80’s. Since then, we have been importing an increas- ing amount of crude oil, as evidenced by the diverging trends. Since March 1993, over half of our total domestic consumption of oil, has come from foreign sources—we currently only produce about 32% of the oil we consume.
See the larger Adobe Reader pdf file.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
The latest available salary figures for 2006, published in the AAPG Explorer (April 2007 issue), indicates that overall, salaries climbed 16 percent.
In the six age groups that Mike Ayling of MLA Resources currently tracks, the largest salary increase was 18% in the 15-19 year category. Entry level geologists saw a 9.5% increase, with the 3-5 year category rising 13 percent.
See the larger Adobe Reader pdf file.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
How cool is this? I just found a new online spreadsheet application that allows you to share, collaborate, and publish spreadsheets that actually work when they are posted on a website, or blog. EditGrid received a very good rating from PC Magazine. The concept is somewhat similar to what is already being done with the online spreadsheet applications of Google Docs, and Zoho. However, the company focuses all of its efforts on the spreadsheet application solely, and apparently does a much better job at it, than either of its competitors.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
This posting is an update of the ”Active Domestic Drilling Rigs and Seismic Crew Count” statistics which I created, and originally posted on the HGS GeoJob Bank ”GeoJob & Energy Statistics” page. However, the HGS page has not been updated since I “retired” as Chair of the Personnel Placement Committee, so I have decided that I would continue updating, and posting the graph here.
See the larger Adobe Reader pdf file.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
For those of you that haven’t had a chance to try out the Coblending feature in version 8.2 of SMT’s VuPak module yet, I would suggest that you give it a look. If you’ve never used anything like it before, be aware that it could max out your wowie-meter! Excuse the enthusiasm, but I like cool (and useful) technology.
(Back in the real world now) What is Coblending? It is just as its name implies—it is the ability to blend two different volumes of seismic data together, and display them both at the same time. Besides being very cool, it could also really be helpful with seismic interpretations—especially in complexly faulted areas.
See the larger Adobe Reader pdf file.
See the VuPak animation
Note: The avi file is fairly large, so it will take some time before the animation starts.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
I found this to be an interesting piece of news, and since it was somewhat related to geoscience, I thought that I would post it this morning.
From NASA’s Near Earth Object Program website:
On January 29, 2008, asteroid 2007 TU24 will pass within 1.4 lunar distances (334,000 miles) of the earth at 2:33 am, Central time. The asteroid is roughly 250 meters (800 feet) in diameter, and somewhat asymmetrical in shape. This is its closest approach to Earth in more than 2,000 years.
The image above has a resolution of about 20-meters (about 66 feet) per pixel, and was taken by the Goldstone antenna—part of NASA’s Deep Space Network Goldstone station in southern California. Goldstone’s 70-meter (230-foot) diameter antenna is capable of tracking a spacecraft traveling more than 16 billion kilometers (10 billion miles) from Earth.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
For anyone who experienced the fluctuations in the oil business during the last 30 years or so, the descriptive “roller coaster ride” in the title only partly explains our adventures.
At the time of the hiring peak of the oil industry—December 1981—there were nearly 1.18 million people employed in the mining industry (a Bureau of Labor Statistics category which includes the oil industry), as seen on the blue employee graph in the image below (generated with Golden Software’s Grapher program).
Oil prices had just peaked at $34.59 per barrel (average monthly price) nine months earlier, but it was still selling at nearly $31 per barrel that December. During the same time period however, March to December 1981, industry unemployment had crept up to 7.5 percent, from just 4.4 percent (black graph in the image below)—an increasing trend that went unappreciated by most of us at the time.
See the larger Adobe Reader pdf file.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
I got the idea for today’s posting from a client’s search for a critical well log—he’s been searching for it for a while now, but hadn’t been able to find it, so far. So, I suggested a few more companies to search, and hence this posting. Since logs are so important for what we do as geoscientists, I thought that the list of sources (in no particular order) that I sent to him, might be helpful to others, as well.
IHS has millions of feet of world-wide coverage of digitized logs, and raster images at: http://www.ihslognet.com/
TGS also has world-wide coverage of digital LAS log files, and raster logs at: http://www.tgsnopec.com/data_solutions/geological_products_services.asp
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
Anyone who has visited the Houston Geological Society’s (HGS) GeoJob Bank, or more specifically the GeoJob & Energy Statistics page, is bound to recognize this graph. During my nearly six-year tenure (2000-2005) as Chair of the Personnel Placement Committee, I created and updated the industry-related graphs on the Statistics page (amoung my many other duties). However, since I “retired” from the Committee in late 2005, the graphs haven’t been updated, so I thought that this would be a good venue to revive some of the graphs, and keep them current with updated information.
This first graph, in a series to come, is the oil and natural gas price curves for 35-years—from January 1973, through the last available data in December 2007. It was created from downloadable data from the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Energy Information Agency, and the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, saved to a spreadsheet, and then graphed with Golden Software’s Grapher program.
See the larger Adobe Reader pdf file.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
If you’re like me you probably spend long hours at the computer. Because of this, it’s easy to develop Repetative Stress Injuries (RSI) if you’ve improperly positioned yourself, your computer equipment, or your office furniture.
I just ran across a few websites that may be helpful and informative as to the proper, ergonomic placement of these items.
The U.S. Governments Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) website provides a lot of useful information concerning Computer Workstations, and provides a Workstation Checklist, and Workstation Purchasing Checklist, Good Working Positions, and Selecting Workstation Components .
Even with the correct design and placement of the workstation, RSI can become a problem unless the risk factors are reduced by Work Process and Recognition, and the Workstation Environment.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
The following is an example of an easy method to import culture lines into an SMT project, using a spreadsheet formatted as an SMT culture line file. Note that this is also applicable for importing polygons.
Suppose you have an SMT project that includes both 2D and 3D seismic data, but you only want to show the 2D line location overlays without the 3D line overlays, to reduce map clutter. Normally, SMT’s 2d/3dPak module only has the option to have all seismic line locations turned on, or to have them all turned off.
In the examples below, the first image, annotated “WITH ALL SURVEY LINES” is how a map would look with the Display Survey Line Option selected (Surveys>Survey Annotation> Line Options>Display Survey Lines). Often, this creates a lot of map clutter (in my opinion), especially if you have many 2D lines, or they are concentrated in one area. This map clutter can distract from the structure map, or other focus of the display.
See the larger Adobe Reader pdf file.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
Do you have a new 3D seismic volume that you need to review quickly? Maybe you just need to scan it to get a feel for the structural trends, or for quickly finding new prospects to concentrate on.
Whatever the case, SMT’s VuPak Chair Cut Animation, a common method of seismic visualization, is a good approach to use for the evaluation. It allows for the simultaneous viewing of three different planes of seismic data, as seen in the image below—Inlines (vertical data surface facing forward), Crosslines (vertical data surface facing towards the left) and Time Slices (horizontal data surface, facing upwards).
The data set being displayed below is a Coherency volume, which is an excellent seismic attribute for highlighting subtle structural and stratigraphic changes in the data. In this case, we’re looking for the major fault trends. Seconds after opening the volume for viewing, we find that there are two significant faults surfaces (the dark purple, linear features being highlighted by the red arrows), which can be seen traversing through various faces of the cube of seismic data volume.
See the VuPak animation (25MB Media Player avi file).
Note: The avi file is fairly large, so it will take some time before the animation starts.
Author: Mike Cline, T/X Resources
Being in business for myself, I have to wear several “hats” during the day. Not only am I a Geophysicist, but also must be adept at geology, marketing/sales, finance, etc. (and now running a blog). Whew, sometimes there doesn’t seem to be enough time in the day!
Another one of my duties, which often seems to take a lot of my time, is being the unofficial, computer support person for several computers: three of my own, one in a currently active client’s office, and three for my family—all with Windows XP (I’ve had no desire to jump to Windows Vista yet, with all of its reported problems, and slowness). It seems that I’m continually fixing something that is broken, corrupted, won’t work, etc., or continually searching for upgrades/fixes, and boy do I get frustrated with the seemingly never-ending problems.
As a result, I have recently started to investigate the possibility of using Linux as an OS (operating system). Let me state here, that I’m not an expert yet, by any means—I’m still way down on the learning curve. There’s still a lot to learn, but I thought that I would share some of what I have found out so far. Here’s a recent Linux user survey that I found, about some of the leading Linux distributions (distro’s in geek speak).