2018 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 17-28
In February 1990, a seminar titled “Seismic Stratigraphy: Fundamentals and Practical Application” as the Distinguished Lecture of American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG) by Professor Peter Vail was held in Japan. The concept of sequence stratigraphy introduced in the seminar gave a huge impact to the attending petroleum explorationists who had desired to learn seismic stratigraphic interpretation method. Those explorationists and their colleagues in Japanese petroleum development companies, who recognized the effectiveness of sequence stratigraphy through the seminar, had started to apply sequence stratigraphic concept and reinterpret their own seismic profiles promptly. However, they also felt a sort of embarrassment in the validity of sedimentological interpretation of seismic profiles without direct geologic proofs and discussion of sedimentary processes under relationship to eustatic changes of sea-level. At the same time, some Japanese sedimentology researchers who had started pioneer studies had been strongly interested in the contents of the seminar, and turned rather affirmative eyes to the tendency of the explorationists. Almost simaltaneously to the seminar, Sedimentological Society of Japan, Tsukuba Association for Strata, Japanese Association for Petroleum Technology, and Geologial Society of Japan provided several study sessions and symposia energetically within a few years, and sedimentology researchers and petroleum explorationists had been researching and exploring with utilization of sequence stratigraphic concepts together in competition each other. Japanese petroleum industry and relating government organizations also supported such activities in a timely manner. As a result, Japanese industry and academia have worked on sequence stratigraphy rather lead the world and contributed to develop sequence stratigraphy.
