The organic-rich, silty Woodford Shale in west-central Oklahoma is a prolific resource play producing gas and liquid hydrocarbons. We calibrated seismic attributes and prestack inversion using well logs and core information within a seismic geomorphologic framework to define the overall basin architecture, major stratigraphic changes, and related variations in lithologies. Core measurements of elastic moduli and total organic content (TOC) indicated that the Woodford Shale can be broken into three elastic petrotypes important to well completion and hydrocarbon enrichment. Upscaling these measurements facilitates regional mapping of petrotypes from prestack seismic inversion of surface data. Seismic attributes highlight rugged topography of the basin floor of the Paleo Woodford Sea, which controls the lateral and vertical distribution of different lithofacies containing variable quantity of TOC as well as quartz, which controls brittleness. Depressions on the basin floor contain TOC-lean cherty lithofacies alternating with TOC-rich lithofacies, resulting in brittle-ductile rock couplets. In contrast, basin floor highs are characterized by overall TOC-rich ductile lithofacies. Seismic attributes illuminate complex post-Woodford tectonic deformation. The Woodford Shale is known to be naturally fractured on outcrop. Image log analysis in other shale plays showed a good correlation between such tectonic features and natural fractures. These features need to be correlated with well trajectories and production data to determine which hypothesized “fracture sets,” if any, improve well performance.
Molecular and intramolecular isotope geochemistry of natural gases from the Woodford Shale, Arkoma Basin, Oklahoma