As the underlying earth science when dealing with groundwater issues, we believe that adopting the best knowledge and technology for geological characterization of the subsurface is of paramount importance. For this reason, we look beyond expertise from only the water sector. Huge budgets have allowed the oil industry to develop sophisticated knowledge and tools for hydrocarbon exploration and the adoption of certain of these skill sets realise significant added value if applied to groundwater scenarios. For instance, the much tighter grip on lithological and diagenetic factors that control reservoir performance are beneficial for more unconventional groundwater occurrences such as deep, fractured or palaeogroundwater aquifers. Other qualities lie in (drainage) basin analysis, seismic interpretation and well assessment and interpretation beyond the well bore.
In addition to upgrading the quality of geological knowledge, the familiarity with petroleum practices brings with it a large professional network to be used, and the access and understanding of a wide range of data that are generally less well known in the water sector. This includes for instance high resolution 2D or 3D seismics, extensive petrophysical well logs or detailed sedimentological data. Also, static and dynamic industry modelling tools become very worthwhile for complex strata and extensive data sets. In addition to specifically hydrological software such as Modflow or FeFlow, we therefore also use typical petroleum geological software packages such Kingdom and Petrel.
Geological activities:
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- Drainage basin analyses & modelling
- Lithofacies identification
- Interpretation of geophysics and seismics
- Petrofysics and log analysis
- Stratification correlations
- Sedimentological analysis
- Geological mapping
- Geological modelling
Typical challenges
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- Genesis of the area?
- Sedimentological environments, formations and facies locations?
- Structural settlement and fault detections?
- Determination of hydro-geological parameters