Survey design and acquisition of a 4-C ocean-bottom seismometer survey over the White Rose oilfield, offshore Newfoundland

Kevin W. Hall, Robert R. Stewart

CREWES, in conjunction with Husky Energy and Dalhousie University, has successfully acquired a 4-C seismic survey over the White Rose field, offshore Newfoundland. To our knowledge, this is the first 4-C ocean-bottom seismic reflection survey acquired in Canada.

Twenty-one ocean bottom seismometers (OBS) were deployed at fifty-metre receiver spacing to form a single 2-D receiver line of one kilometre length. The OBS were deployed in about one hour. Twelve eight-kilometre shot lines, at 50 to 200 metre shot line spacing, were acquired parallel to the receiver line at a rate of about 1 line every 75 minutes. All the OBS were recovered over a period of 10.5 hours, and data was successfully recovered from twenty of these. When binned with 25x25-metre bins, twelve CMP stacked sections were obtained, with a maximum fold of twenty-six. Asymptotic binning, assuming a Vp/Vs value of 3.1, resulted in eleven converted wave stacks with a maximum fold of sixty-eight. We plan to return to the White Rose area to acquire a larger survey with upgraded OBS in the spring or summer of 2003.