Gulf of Mexico 2016 seepage studyAs a world-leading satellite remote sensing service provider, NPA Satellite Mapping (NPA) detect, interpret, classify and monitor natural seepage and pollution slicks occurring in offshore environments.

Gulf of Mexico Western Planning Area seepage studyThe Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has announced that lease sale 248 will be taking place in August 2016. This round consists of the Western Planning Area of the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, which has already been covered by NPA’s satellite seepage detection project.

Seepage detection by SAR (Synthetic Aperture Radar) is a proven technique for mapping surface oil seeps which could provide the first indication of offshore petroleum systems:

•NPA currently have 207 interpreted SAR scenes over the Western Planning Area blocks.

•NPA are currently in the process of increasing the number of scenes in areas of sparser coverage.

Background

The offshore Gulf of Mexico is one of the world’s most prolific petroleum provinces with both the U.S. and Mexico holding major reserves of both oil and gas. In the U.S., exploration into deep and ultra-deep waters over the past ten years has been a continuing success story.

This lease sale covers the entire Texas offshore as far south as the Sigsbee Escarpment with a string of oil discoveries by Shell and others. There are many oil and gas fields along the Texan coast, but the prolific deepwater Central Gulf of Mexico oil province appears to peter out westwards in a region always assumed to be gas-prone. However, there are some scattered oil discoveries in the region as well as some interesting observations of chemosynthetics and seabed seeps (as recorded in CGG’s Seep Explorer Database). This suggests a wider oil-prone footprint, which the NPA seepage study, using multiple repeat scenes (in excess of 10x coverage), has directly addressed.

Archive coverage over the 2016 Western Planning Area blocks.

Detection of repeating seepage in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico.

Offshore Seeps Study

License block coverage

Seep detection

© NPA 2016

© ESA© NPA 2016

NPA Satellite Mapping - Offshore Services

CGG Worldwide Headquarters - Tour Maine-Montparnasse - 33, avenue du Maine - B.P. 191 - 75755 Paris Cedex 15, FRANCE +33 1 64 47 45 00

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General Contact Michael King - Offshore Services Manager michael.king@cgg.com Tel: +44 (0)1732 865023

Alan Williams - Oil & Gas Manager alan.williams@cgg.com Tel: +44 (0)1732 865023

Comprehensive mapping and categorization of offshore oil seeps is essential for efficient offshore oil and gas exploration. Enhanced and interpreted SAR satellite imagery is capable of identifying key regions of seepage, thus focusing exploration efforts and reducing costs.

Coverage •Multiple coverage - up to 10x coverage becoming standard

•Optimal satellite SAR data selected from weather screening of the world’s SAR archives

•Data integrated and interpreted with supporting geological, geophysical and geochemical data from Robertson, where available

•New high-resolution data from TerraSAR-X, Radarsat-2 and COSMO-SkyMed satellites used for license studies

Deliverables •Full ArcGIS* deliverables with all scenes and slick images

georeferenced and hyperlinked

•Unique repeats database comparing seep locations using multi-date coverage

•Results overlaid and compared to collateral data layers including: bathymetry, gravity, sedimentary thickness, magnetics, shipping lanes and ship wrecks

•New ship and rig layer available for all scenes to complement the interpretation

Additional unique features •Repeat database and seepage intensity maps - related to

basin leakiness parameters

•Seep data accessible via the Robertson Tellus geological database

•Complete CGG validation chain - Seeps - Multibeam - Drop Cores - Geochemistry

*ArcGIS is a registered trademark of Environmental Systems Research Institute, Inc. (ESRI).

Global Offshore Seeps Database

Current coverage of our Global Offshore Seeps Database.

An explanation of how seeps form and are detected by satellite.

Global offshore seeps coverage

The principle of seeps

© NPA 2016

© NPA 2016

NPA Satellite Mapping - Offshore Services

cgg.com/npa