Petroleum potential assessment using an optimized fuzzy outranking approach: A case study of the Red River petroleum system, Williston Basin

Abstract

<jats:p> This paper presents a new approach, called optimized fuzzy Preference Ranking Organization METHod for Enrichment Evaluation (PROMETHEE), based on combining fuzzy logic, an outranking method and the cuckoo search optimization algorithm to assess petroleum potential in a spatial framework. The approach brings together flexibility and simplicity to solve petroleum exploration problem under uncertainty using experts’ knowledge and the information associated with the discovered oil pools simultaneously. The characteristics of the essential elements of the petroleum system are used as key criteria in the model. To exemplify the approach, a case study was undertaken in the Red River petroleum system of the Canadian portion of the Williston Basin. Eight datasets related to the selected criteria were integrated by the optimized fuzzy PROMETHEE to create a map that makes it possible to identify the areas of highest petroleum potential. All discovered oil pools in the Red River petroleum system were used in the verification process. The results indicated that the proposed approach can deal effectively with incomplete data and imprecise information, and can be efficiently used in petroleum exploration, thereby reducing the cost and risk of exploration. </jats:p>

Investigating for hydrocarbon potential in the Sarvak and Ilam Formations using Fuzzy logic in the Fars Region, Iran

“…Depending on various factors, areas can be divided into low to very high exploration priorities. So far, several researchers have identified areas with hydrocarbon potential by using multiple-criteria decisions and Fuzzy logic (An et al, 1991;Aminzadeh, 1994;Malczewski, 1999;Barrel, 2000;Gao et al, 2000;Zargani et al, 2003;Tounsi, 2005;Bingham et al, 2012;Masoudi et al, 2012;Amiri et al, 2014;Mohammed et al, 2017;Masoudi et al, 2018;Okwu and Nwachukwu, 2018;Hamzeh and Karimipour, 2020;Taheri and Tait, 2021). Bingham et al (2012) combined geological data, wells and oil fields information, geochemistry, seismography, and isopach maps in the GIS environment using Fuzzy logic-based Multiple -criteria decisions.…”

A novel Mahalanobis distance method for predicting oil and gas resource spatial distribution

“…Petroleum exploration is mainly conducted to find economically recoverable reserves, but it is a high-risk high-cost investment activity with many complexities and uncertainties (Hamzeh and Karimipour, 2020b). From 1980 to 2016, China National Petroleum Corporation(CNPC) drilled 40730 exploratory wells in prospective areas, among which there were only 17371 wells with economic oil and gas flow, accounting for 42.6% (Guo et al, 2019).…”