Elimination of land internal multiples based on the inverse scattering series

Despite the explosion of new, innovative technologies in the area of multiple identification and subsequent attenuation, their applicability is mostly limited to marine environments especially in deep water. In land seismic data sets however, the application of such multiple-elimination methodologies is not always straightforward and in many cases poor results are obtained. The unique characteristics of land seismic data (i.e., noise, statics and coupling) are major obstacles in multiple estimation and subsequent elimination. The well-defined surface multiples present in marine data are rarely identifiable in land data. Particularly in desert terrains with a complex near surface and low-relief structures, surface multiples hardly exist. In most cases, we are dealing with so called “near-surface-related multiples.” These are primarily internal multiples generated within the complex near surface.