Marine Controlled Source Electromagnetic - mCSEM is a new geophysical technology which has been successfully applied to hydrocarbon exploration in the last ten years. This method consists of a horizontal electric dipole (HED) moving just above the sea floor, operating at low frequencies (0.1-1.0 Hz). The fixed receivers distributed regularly on the sea floor capture the electromagnetic fields related with the diffusion of energy generated by the dipole transmitter, the sea water and the sediments, including the petroleum reservoir. In this work we present a finite element algorithm for 3D mCSEM modeling. The performance of the algorithmis illustrated by means of some selected examples in literature. In this work we propose also an algorithm for inversion of three-dimensional mCSEM synthetic datafor two frequencies. Results that illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm are also discussed.
applied geophysics; electromagnetic methods; finite elements; geophysical inversion; Marquardt method; Marine Controlled Source Electromagnetic (mCSEM); oil exploration; deep waters
