A New Approach for Desert Reservoir Exploration: Terahertz Prospecting

An accurate, nondestructive, and economic prospecting technique is of utmost significance to explore petroleum resources in desert, however, the typically used technologies fail to provide direct and noninvasive detection. Here, we demonstrated a terahertz (THz) prospecting method for predicting the distribution of oil reservoir by extracting the sands from the surface areas in a desert oilfield. The accuracy of THz prospecting reached to more than 80%. The trace organic matters migrating from underground reservoir to surface sands can be detected by THz spectroscopy, which was the mechanism of THz spectroscopy for reservoir exploration. The long-chain alkanes, nitro organics, and aromatic compounds were also confirmed by thermogravimetric analysis system coupled with Fourier transform infrared and mass spectroscopy. When the trace organics were decomposed from sands, the THz response was equivalent to that of other sands. Consequently, the petroleum prospecting method on the basis of THz spectroscopy is useful for the improvement and optimization of geophysical exploration system in desert.