The easy oil has already been found. But thankfully, rapidly evolving equipment and techniques make it possible for companies to find and produce fields in remote and challenging areas, and to bring small discoveries into the supply chain. The industry is able to feed the world's growing appetite for energy because of its steady stream of innovations. In coming years, the industry will sustain its relentless drive to improve processes and lower costs. Geophysics will integrate with other disciplines to comb the subsurface in finer detail; rigs will continue to turn to the right, but faster than in the past; and demands for completion services will skyrocket. Deepwater production systems will bring greater volumes of previously inaccessible oil and gas onstream. It is, after all, what the E&P industry does. Exciting years lie ahead for geophysics, says Dr. Tom Davis, professor of geophysics, Colorado School of Mines. "We have a wonderful opportunity going forward with fresh, new students becoming more interested in the oil industry." Growing numbers of students are taking up geoscience and petroleum engineering, and they are arming themselves with technology and integrating many disciplines. In the coming years, reservoir characterization and exploitation work will dominate geophysics, says Davis. Efforts will center on raising recovery efficiencies in existing fields, and on applying time-lapse and 4-D seismic to both onshore and offshore fields. Today, most true exploration is carried out in offshore basins. "But we are going to have to come back onshore, and we will have to explore in difficult areas and in deeper sediments," he says. Arctic regions, volcanic-covered basins and environmentally sensitive areas will all garner close attention, and wells to depths greater than 20,000 feet will be much more common. A strong positive of the present industry boom is its spurring of more geophysical research, particularly in land-based acquisition systems. The use of permanent acquisition systems, which are already in place in some areas in the North Sea and Gulf of Mexico, will rise sharply. Manufacturers are focusing on the development of reliable systems that are cost-effective and fit to purpose. Dramatic improvements in systems will continue, and these will help reduce the industry's environmental impact. Helicopter support, single sensors and single stations, and walk-in surveys are minimizing footprints in areas of special concern. And, new systems require fewer people to set up, which reduces surface disturbances. "Everything is getting smaller and more energy efficient. The power consumption of the new systems is much lower, and we can record for longer periods of time." These systems can also record both actively and passively, so active acquisition can be scheduled to avoid large mobilization and demobilization costs. In the coming years, geophysics will continue to move from its traditional acoustic foundation. "We're looking at elastic waves to improve our understanding of geomechanics," says Davis. "We are trying to break the code to use seismic data in the development of unconventional resources, and we are using elastic waves because they are very sensitive to small changes in stress." That's crucial, because the development of resource plays requires an understanding of fracture systems. Elastic waves can identify natural fracture systems, which can help a company drill its best well locations first, and avoid drilling frameworks of marginal wells. Another key element of the unconventional cipher is the ability to monitor hydraulic stimulations through seismic. "We need to optimize artificial fracturing within the reservoir, and we now can see changes that were not detectable in the past." The subtle changes are due to improvements in acquiring, processing and analyzing elastic-wave data, and in tying data into the subsurface. Research is focusing on understanding fractured zones, and how these zones behave when stimulated. Also, elastic waves can image stress compartments and zones that are overpressured, and in resource plays these pressure variations often closely correlate to productivity. Nonetheless, acoustic waves remain a fundamental tool. The future of seismic is the full-wave field, in which elements of acoustic and elastic waves are combined. "We're trying to augment sound waves. There are different types of waves, and in some cases they are superior in certain areas and in others they lack imaging capabilities," says Davis. The future of geophysics is even more inclusive: full-wave seismic will become customarily integrated with other prospecting methods. To successfully work in an increasingly complex industry, companies will have to develop niche areas that they specialize in, and they will have to supplement traditional seismic with electromagnetic, gravity and magnetic techniques. Even natural methods such as magnetotellurics will be increasingly mined for their information. "In the end, there are not a lot of new things, but they can be put together in new ways. We need to use everything we can to allow us to see the unseen."

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