SATELITE-BASED SEISMIC MOBILE INFORMATION AND CONTROL SYSTEM

• US 20020152053A1
• Filed: 04/27/2000
• Published: 10/17/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 04/30/1999
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Veritas DGC, Inc. (CGG)
• Original Assignee: Veritas DGC, Inc. (CGG)
• Inventors: Krakiwsky, Edward J., Roy, James, Krakiwsky, Sean E., Portsmouth, Jackie L.A.
• Granted Patent: US 6,560,565 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 702/185
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 1/003 Seismic data acquisition in general, e.g. survey design G01V1/3808, G01V1/42 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 1/22 Transmitting seismic signals to recording or processing apparatus

Abstract

Abstract of Disclosure

A seismic system, Seismic Mobile Information & Control System (Seis-MICS) comprising field resources, satellite resources, and office resources. The field resources include various personnel, equipment, and vehicles located in the general vicinity of the seismic project. The field resources include transceivers permitting various of the field resources to communicate directly, or indirectly, to the office resources via one or more satellites. The office resources include satellite earth hubs/stations, a server-side hardware, software, and data store, and user workstations. The seismic system advantageously facilitates real or near real time transmission of data between the field and office environment, thereby providing an efficient seismic operation.

Claims

1. A seismic system for coordinating a seismic survey involving an office and seismic field equipment in a field location, comprising:

a satellite wide area network including a first set of satellites linking the office to a receiver in the field, said receiver comprising one type of said field equipment; and

a local area messaging and tracking network linking together various of said field equipment and providing data and message communication between said various field equipment.

2. The seismic system of claim 1 further including a positioning subsystem comprising ground-based satellite receivers and a second set of satellites, said ground-based receivers receiving signals from said second set of satellites to determine receiver position data and transmitting said receiver position data via said satellite wide area network to the home office.

3. The seismic system of claim 1 further including connections to an on-line network to permit predetermined persons access to various seismic information.

4. The seismic system of claim 3 wherein said on-line network comprises the Internet.

5. The seismic system of claim 1 wherein said first set of satellites includes low earth orbit (LEO) and geostationary (GEO) satellites.

6. The seismic system of claim 1 wherein said satellite wide area network also includes an uplink transceiver configured to communicate with said first set of satellites.

7. The seismic system of claim 6 wherein said satellite wide area network also includes a wireless base station transceiver for communicating to a first set of field equipment, said wireless base station transceiver coupled to said uplink transceiver to provide communication between the first set of field equipment and the head office.

8. The seismic system of claim 7 wherein said local area messaging and tracking network includes a wireless base station transceiver for communicating to a second set of field equipment, said wireless base station transceiver coupled to uplink transceiver to provide communication between the second set of field equipment and the head office.

9. A seismic survey system, comprising:

a plurality of satellites orbiting the earth;

a plurality of seismic field equipment usable in the general vicinity of an area to be seismically surveyed, each of said plurality of seismic field equipment including a communications transceiver;

an earth station hub wirelessly coupled to said plurality of field equipment through said plurality of satellites; and

a workstation coupled to said earth station hub that receives information from the plurality of field equipment and relaying messages to the field equipment.

10. The seismic survey system of claim 9 wherein said plurality of satellites include low earth orbit satellites.

11. The seismic survey system of claim 9 wherein said plurality of satellites also include geostationary satellites.

12. The seismic survey system of claim 9 wherein said plurality satellites include global positioning system satellites.

13. A seismic system, comprising:

a plurality of field equipment usable in the vicinity of an area to be seismically surveyed, each of said plurality of field equipment including a satellite transceiver;

an earth station hub coupled to said plurality of field equipment through one or more orbiting satellites; and

a workstation coupled to said earth station hub;

said workstation and field equipment in communication with each other via said earth station hub.

14. The seismic system of claim 13 further including GPS receivers to compute position data of selected field sites.

15. The seismic system of claim 14 wherein said position data is communicated in near real time to said earth station hub.

16. The seismic system of claim 13 further including portable personal data assistants and an antenna coupled to a satellite transceiver located in the field, said PDA communicates through the satellite transceiver to the earth station hub.

17. The seismic system of claim 13 including an antenna tower located in the field to provide communication with various of said plurality of field equipment, said antenna tower coupled to a satellite transceiver.

18. A seismic system, comprising:

a satellite receiver that receives signals from an orbiting satellite to determine position of a site in a field location;

a portable device including memory that stores a predetermined set of position data; and

a quality control software module that compares position determined by said satellite receiver to the predetermined set of position data.

19. A method for conducting a seismic survey operation, comprising:

(a)monitoring the location of equipment and personnel in the field;

(b)computing quality control parameters indicative of how accurately (a) is performed;

(c)transmitting the quality control parameters to an information and control center via one or more satellites;

(d)receiving the quality control parameters in the information and control center;

(e)processing the seismic data quality control parameters in the information and control center; and

(f)transmitting status messages from the information and control center to personnel in the field via one or more satellites.

20. The method of claim 19 further including providing the quality control parameters to a client over an on-line network.

21. The method of claim 20 wherein the network includes the Internet.

22. An integrated seismic system that provides near real-time communication between field assets and non-field assets, comprising:

a project management module;

a mobilization and demobilization module;

a surveying module;

a drilling module; and

a recording module;

said modules operatively coupled together to permit near real-time transmission of data during a seismic survey from a field location to a control center remotely located from the field in which said data can be verified and analyzed.

23. The integrated seismic system of claim 22 wherein at least two of said modules are operatively coupled together by satellite transmissions.

24. The integrated seismic system of claim 23 wherein said data includes positional data of locations in the field and wherein said project management module includes a knowledge base that permits near real-time verification of the accuracy of the positional data.

25. The integrated seismic system of claim 24 wherein said project management module includes software that provides a proposed solution if the positional data received from the field are not sufficiently close to pre-plot coordinates.

26. The integrated system of claim 25 wherein said proposed solutions are provided for examination by humans and the human-approved solutions are transmitted back to the field.

27. The integrated seismic system of claim 24 wherein said data also includes seismic data.

28. The integrated seismic system of claim 24 wherein said data also includes permitting information.

29. The integrated seismic system of claim 24 wherein said data also includes drilling-related data.

30. The integrated seismic system of claim 24 wherein said data also includes access information.

31. The integrated seismic system of claim 22 further including a publicly available network connection whereby the data transmitted from the field location can be viewed at a remote site coupled to the network connection.

32. A process of conducting a seismic operation, comprising:

determining actual location coordinate data in a field location;

transmitting said actual location coordinate data to a remote site in near real-time;

comparing said actual location coordinate data to pre-plot theoretical coordinates;

determining whether said actual location coordinate data is within specification of the pre-plot theoretical coordinates; and

if said actual location coordinate data is not within specification of the pre-plot theoretical coordinates, generating a proposed solution to correct the problem and transmitting said proposed solution back to the field location.

33. The process of claim 32 further including transmitting in near real-time seismic data from a field location to said remote site.

34. The process of claim 33 wherein said data includes permitting data.

35. The process of claim 33 wherein said data includes drilling data.

36. The process of claim 33 wherein said data includes access information.

37. The process of claim 33 further including providing access to said coordinate and seismic data via an online service.