Distributed acoustic sensing microseismic reflection imaging for hydraulic fracture and fault lineament characterization

ABSTRACT This study presents a novel workflow designed for migrating reflected S waves generated by microseismic events, as recorded by downhole distributed acoustic sensing (DAS), to characterize hydraulic fractures in three dimensions. In contrast to existing fracture imaging techniques, which have encountered challenges in accurately representing fracture networks and often rely on simplified models, our imaging technique does not assume that fractures are planar or in a prespecified orientation. DAS seismic measurements benefit from the large aperture and dense spatial sampling enabled by the kilometers-long fiber and, therefore, are able to capture a large number of strong reflections compared with traditional borehole geophones or accelerometers. We treat microseismic events as high-frequency sources and apply prestack Kirchhoff migration to each individual source after wavefield separation. Fracture imaging results for multiple selected events are then stacked to generate a 3D reflectivity volume, revealing the subsurface fracture and fault networks in intricate detail. The high-resolution fracture images generated by the developed reflection migrating process illuminate the heart of the stimulated volume of the reservoir, a zone that is often challenging to access using conventional surface arrays or active sources. To validate the effectiveness of our workflow, our study uses a data set acquired during a multiwell project in the Eagle Ford Shale and Austin Chalk in South Texas. To assess the accuracy and reliability of the results, the reflection imaging output is integrated with the microseismicity distribution and strain measurements from low-frequency DAS for interpretation. The results of reflection imaging improve our understanding of fracture geometry, including distal fractures that are away from the monitoring well, allow the direct estimation of fracture height and length, and potentially signify the presence of preexisting fluid-filled fault lineaments.