\n The rate of seismicity in the hydrocarbon‐producing Fort Worth Basin of north‐central Texas, which underlies the Dallas–Fort Worth metropolitan area, increased markedly from 2008 through 2015, coinciding spatiotemporally with injection of 2 billion barrels of wastewater into deep aquifers. Although the rate of seismicity has declined with injection rates, some earthquake sequences remained active in 2018 and new clusters have developed. Most of this seismicity occurred away from regionally mapped faults, challenging efforts to constrain the continuing hazards of injection‐induced seismicity in the basin. Here, we present detailed new models of potentially seismogenic faults and the stress field, which we use to build a probabilistic assessment of fault‐slip potential. Our new fault map, based on reflection seismic data, tens of thousands of well logs, and outcrop characterization, includes 251 basement‐rooted normal faults that strike dominantly north‐northeast, several of which extend under populated areas. The updated stress map indicates a relatively consistent north‐northeast–south‐southwest azimuth of the maximum horizontal principal stress over seismically active parts of the basin, with a transition from strike‐slip faulting in the north to normal faulting in the southeast. Based on these new data, our probabilistic analysis shows that a majority of the total trace length of the mapped faults have slip potential that is equal to or higher than that of the faults that have already hosted injection‐induced earthquake sequences. We conclude that most faults in the system are highly sensitive to reactivation, and we postulate that many faults are still unidentified. Ongoing injection operations in the region should be conducted with these understandings in mind.

Injection-Induced Seismicity and Fault-Slip Potential in the Fort Worth Basin, Texas

In 2017, distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) technology was deployed in a horizontal well to conduct a vertical seismic profiling survey before and after each of 78 hydraulic fracturing stag...

Modeling the seismic response of individual hydraulic fracturing stages observed in a time-lapse distributed acoustic sensing vertical seismic profiling survey

Paleokarst systems are found extensively in carbonate-prone basins worldwide. They can form large reservoirs and provide efficient pathways for hydrocarbon migration, but they can also create serious engineering geohazards. The full delineation of potentially buried paleokarst systems plays an important role for reservoir characterization, oil and gas production, and other engineering tasks. We propose a supervised convolutional neural network (CNN) to automatically and accurately characterize paleokarst and associated collapse features from 3-D seismic images. To avoid time-consuming manual labeling for training the CNN, we propose an efficient workflow to automatically generate numerous 3-D training image pairs including synthetic seismic images and the corresponding label images of the collapsed paleokarst features simulated in the seismic images. With this workflow, we are able to simulate realistic and diverse geologic structures and collapsed paleokarst features in the training images from which the CNN can effectively learn to recognize the collapsed paleokarst features in real field seismic images. Two field examples from the Fort Worth Basin demonstrate that our CNN-based method is superior to conventional automatic methods in delineating paleokarst collapse features from seismic images. From the CNN-based paleokarst characterization, we can further automatically extract 3-D collapsed paleokarst systems and quantitatively measure their geometric parameters. Our CNN-based method is highly efficient and takes only seconds to classify collapsed paleokarst features a 3-D seismic image with 320× 1, 024× 1, 024 samples (approximately 268 km2) by using one graphics processing unit.

Deep Learning for Characterizing Paleokarst Collapse Features in 3-D Seismic Images

From 2006 through mid-2018, there have been 125 Mw≥2.5 recorded earthquakes within the Fort Worth Basin and the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area. There is general scientific consensus th...

Structural characterization of potentially seismogenic faults in the Fort Worth Basin

Detection and quantification of underground CO2 leakage into the soil using a fiber-optic sensor

Time-Lapse Imaging of a Hydraulic Stimulation Using 4D Vertical Seismic Profiles and Fiber Optics in the Midland Basin (Part B)

Supervising Professor: Robert J. Stern, PhD The Muenster Uplift is a positive structural feature characterized by NW-SE trending reverse faults extending ~300 km (200 miles) in the subsurface from the Wichita Uplift in southwestern Oklahoma to the Ouachita fold and thrust belt in northeast Texas. It shares a similar structural style to other Late Paleozoic Ancestral Rockies basement-involved uplifts throughout the westcentral United States. It is a strongly asymmetric structure, bounded by a fault to the SW, with considerable offset to the downthrown foreland Fort Worth Basin. Gravity strongly correlates with the uplift, with steep gradients on the SW. Seismic and well data indicate a thrust fault offsetting Precambrian basement by greater than 10,000’ (~3 km). The uplift began developing in Late Mississippian time and remained active through Late Pennsylvanian time. It has since remained as a positive structural element, although buried by Cretaceous sediments and has no surface expression. The Muenster Uplift played an important role in the depositional patterns and tectonic evolution of the Fort Worth Basin.

The Muenster Uplift of North Texas: The Easternmost Expression of the Pennsylvanian Ancestral Rockies

The muenster uplift of north texas

Careful mapping of shallow drilling hazards is key to operating an oil field safely and economically. In the Midland Basin, historical information indicates that shallow gas in the Salado Formation may result in blowouts. By using recently acquired higher-resolution 3D seismic surveys, we can identify circular high-amplitude anomalies that we interpret to be nitrogen-filled gas pockets. The larger pockets can be mapped and avoided before drilling a well. Detecting gas pockets in the Salado Formation may require modern 3D coverage or higher-resolution seismic drill site surveys if older low-fold seismic data are available at the drilling locations. The smallest pockets may not be detectable by any means. Although some of the larger anomalies are visible on older 3D surveys, most only became visible with the advent of higher-fold denser 3D seismic surveys. The anomalies sometimes follow a linear pattern. However, most are isolated in nature and appear as circular features in plan view and usually lenticular or columnar in section view. The anomalies range in size from a few traces in width (tens of feet or meters) to more than 1000 ft (300 m) in width or length. Seismic modeling suggests that the anomalies are very low P-wave velocity zones (about half of the velocity of the surrounding salt) and exhibit longer seismic traveltimes or push-down effects on reflections underneath the larger anomalies.

Identification and analysis of Salado Formation amplitude anomalies in the Midland Basin

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Papers

Time-Lapse Imaging of a Hydraulic Stimulation Using 4D Vertical Seismic Profiles and Fiber Optics in the Midland Basin (Part B)

The Muenster Uplift of North Texas: The Easternmost Expression of the Pennsylvanian Ancestral Rockies

The muenster uplift of north texas

Identification and analysis of Salado Formation amplitude anomalies in the Midland Basin