Well tops guided prediction of reservoir properties using modular neural network concept: A case study from western onshore, India

• A novel workflow to model sand fraction from three seismic attributes is proposed.
• The workflow relies on modularity and synchronization concepts.
• We report results by implementing the workflow on field data.
• High correlation and low error values are obtained in reduced program execution time.
• Filtering based post-processing improves visualization.

This paper proposes a complete framework consisting pre-processing, modeling, and post-processing stages to carry out well tops guided prediction of a reservoir property (sand fraction) from three seismic attributes (seismic impedance, instantaneous amplitude, and instantaneous frequency) using the concept of modular artificial neural network (MANN). The dataset used in this study, comprising three seismic attributes and well log data from eight wells, is acquired from a western onshore hydrocarbon field of India. Firstly, the acquired dataset is integrated and normalized. Then, well log analysis and segmentation of the total depth range into three different units (zones) separated by well tops are carried out. Secondly, three different networks are trained corresponding to three different zones using combined dataset of seven wells and then trained networks are validated using the remaining test well. The target property of the test well is predicted using three different tuned networks corresponding to three zones; and then the estimated values obtained from three different networks are concatenated to represent the predicted log along the complete depth range of the testing well. The application of multiple simpler networks instead of a single one improves the prediction accuracy in terms of performance evaluators – correlation coefficient, root mean square error, absolute error mean and program execution time. Then, volumetric prediction of reservoir properties is carried out using calibrated network parameters. This stage is followed by post-processing to improve visualization. Thus, a complete framework, which includes pre-processing, model building and validation, volumetric prediction, and post-processing, is designed for successful mapping between seismic attributes and a reservoir characteristic. The proposed framework outperformed a single artificial neural network in terms of reduced prediction error, program execution time and improved correlation coefficient as a result of application of the MANN concept.