US-based TDI-Brooks International, under contract to TGS, has completed a multi-beam survey offshore the Niger Delta in Nigeria.
The survey, which took place in water depths of 750 to 3,500 metres, is Nigeria's first regional multi-client multi-beam and seafloor sampling (MB&SS) study.
TDI-Brooks' survey vessel Gyre (pictured) acquired 82,000 square kilometres of high-resolution hull-mounted multi-beam echosounder data. During the multi-beam data collection, a total of 1,223 active hydrocarbon seeps were detected.
Onboard hydrocarbon seep analysis was conducted in near real-time onboard the vessel to expedite the process of core selection.
The survey vessel Proteus is scheduled to begin acquisition of the follow-up surface geochemical exploration (SGE) coring campaign in July 2020. Approximately 245 piston core samples targeting suspected seep features selected from the MBES dataset will be collected, along with an additional 45 additional piston core samples for geotechnical and biostratigraphic studies.
An additional 17 surface heat flow measurements will also be collected as part of the programme.
SGE is a petroleum prospecting tool based on the premise that traces of upward migrated petroleum from deep source rocks and reservoirs can be detected in targeted seabed sediments and used to evaluate exploration potential.
