Each Firefly unit is connected by small wire to ION's VectorSeis sensor for full-wave imaging

ION Geophysical Corporation has delivered its FireFly system, reportedly the world’s first cableless land seismic acquisition system, to one of the world’s largest seismic contractors. This first commercial deployment, consisting of several-thousand stations, is taking place in a producing hydrocarbon basin containing reservoirs that have proven difficult to image with conventional seismic techniques.

ION developed FireFly to address several needs of both E&P companies and seismic acquisition contractors. This cableless system, which uses multiple communications protocols including Bluetooth and VHF radio to transmit seismic data, is capable of full-wave land acquisition. This makes it well suited for applications including:

• Dealing with abrupt, near-surface velocity changes in the Arctic or in deserts
• Imaging thin, stratified, highly faulted, or steeply dipping reservoirs
• Delineating lithology (rock type) changes
• Determining fluid types and fluid movements, especially in 4D programs
• Minimizing ambient noise in data acquired near existing oil and gas fields
• Accounting for anisotropy in the subsurface
• Mapping fracture networks in reservoirs
• Delivering low frequency data (down to 1?2 Hz) for amplitude versus offset (AVO) and inversion.

A hand-held device is used for tracking navigation and positioning of the FireFly units.

FireFly’s benefits include:

Reduced System Weight. Equipment such as cables and miscellaneous ground equipment for most conventional seismic surveys may weigh 25 tons or more. Transporting and then deploying this quantity of heavy equipment in the field drives up acquisition costs, but ION states that its cableless system eliminates most of this excess weight. As a result of this weight reduction alone, a typical onshore survey in North America can reportedly experience a nearly 20% reduction in operational costs.

Improved Operational Efficiency. Deploying, rolling, troubleshooting, and repairing a cable-based system is a manpower-intensive operation. ION estimates that 25?50% of the individuals tasked with spread deployment and retrieval are involved in cable-based activity, while 50?75% of troubleshooting personnel are focused on cable problems. By eliminating cables, ION states that FireFly will reduce manpower and logistics intensity compared to conventional seismic operations.

Reduced Health, Safety, and Environmental Risks. By removing heavy cables and reducing manpower intensity during acquisition operations, the new system offers much less health and safety risk to field crews. Additionally, the removal of cables and a smaller spread footprint dramatically reduces the risk of damage to sensitive environmental areas.

Improved System Availability. In conventional land seismic acquisitions, only 50% of a crew’s average work day is spent on actual acquisition, with the rest of the operational time devoted to cable troubleshooting. As a single-station system, FireFly overcomes these cable-based limitations and delivers productivity improvements that increase as station counts increase.

Improved Illumination. Cable-based architectures impose constraints on how surveys are designed. For instance, sensors must be spaced in gridded geometries that prevent surveys from being tailored to unique surface, near-surface, and subsurface challenges. Many geophysicists see the ideal survey design as having upwards of 50,000 stations, a goal made operationally impractical by cable-based systems. FireFly imposes no such constraints, which allows for the acquisition of more fully sampled data from the subsurface.

In announcing the first commercial deployment of this system, Bob Peebler, ION’s Chief Executive Officer, commented, “We originally planned to commercialize our FireFly system in North America to be closer to our technology centers, but those plans were altered due to the significant slowdown in seismic activity among our US and Canadian contractor customers. I’m delighted that we were able to adjust our plans so quickly and deliver our first commercial system to a long-standing customer with a global operating footprint.”

Peebler also stated that the company is shifting its business model to include rental and leasing options for customers, with the aim of expanding the pool of customers who might not otherwise be able to shoot FireFly seismic surveys in the current global economic climate.