WATCH: inApril Tests Its Seabed Seismic Acquisition System

The Norwegian seismic equipment supplier inApril AS has carried out a full-scale sea trial of its fully integrated node-based seabed seismic acquisition system, Venator.

The company says the trial confirmed that Venator is the first seabed-based exploration tool to provide data far superior to conventional towed streamer solutions at competitive terms.

The system was tested in 110 meters water depth over a part of the Edvard Grieg field (PL 338), operated by Lundin, in the Norwegian North Sea. The node used was inApril’s A3000 node, suitable for both deep and shallow water operations.

The trial repeatedly demonstrated ‘node-on-a-rope’ deployment speeds of 5 – 6 knots and retrieval speeds at 3 – 4 knots in these water depths, enabling up to 20 km² full-azimuth data acquisition per day in exploration mode.

Preliminary results confirm the excellent data quality also shown by previous sea trials, only achievable by seabed data acquisition. Data processing will be carried out in the coming weeks.

According to numerous industry executives and analysts, more efficient node-based ocean bottom seismic could provide the optimal solution for oil companies looking to increase reserves at reasonable costs via targeted exploration and reservoir characterization data acquisition, inApril noted.

Vidar Hovland, CEO of inApril, said: “The market has been waiting to see if we can deliver what we promised. Now we have documented that Venator offers a game-changing, cost-effective, and fully automated exploration and reservoir characterization tool. The system is flexible and can be containerized for mobilization to a variety of vessels for a range of offshore seismic applications and water depths.”