Passive seismic monitoring of an injection-production process in an oilfield using reverse time imaging

Abstract

Monitoring underground fluid migration caused by injection/production processes is crucial for guiding petroleum exploitation in mature oilfields and ultimately enhancing petroleum production. In this paper, we propose a time-lapse reverse time imaging (RTI) to dynamically monitor the injection/production processes within oilfield. By utilizing RTI to track microseimicities at different time periods, we can analyze the relationship between injection/production activities and the spatiotemporal changes in microseismic distribution. The inferred relationship enables the time-lapse RTI to infer fluid migration patterns within oil reservoirs. To assess the accuracy and spatiotemporal resolution of the time-lapse RTI, we conducted numerical experiments to evaluate the imaging quality under different microseismic distribution scenarios. In addition, we assessed the method's stability under low signal-to-noise ratio conditions. Numerical results indicate that the time-lapse RTI can effectively distinguish the spatiotemporal variations of seismic swarms at depths of 0.5 kilometers within the target layer, even in the presence of strong noise. Practical applications show a significant correlation between changes in swarm distribution surrounding reservoirs and fluctuations in oil production. Utilizing time-lapse RTI enables real-time monitoring of oilfield injection/production processes, thereby offering valuable insights for optimizing oilfield development and fostering future increases in petroleum production.