NET-TO-GROSS RATIO

NED ETRIS, Ph. D., P. Geol., BRUCE STEWART, M. Eng.

Geologists are often asked to provide maps
of net-to-gross ratio, but this term can mean
different things to different disciplines, often
causing confusion and misunderstanding.
So what could "net-to-gross" mean? The
quick answer to some is: it doesn't matter; it
is net pay that matters! The more helpful
answer is: It depends. Which net and which
gross is the speaker is talking about? Is it
thickness, reservoir, or pay?
To sort out the confusion, there are several
terms (and combinations of terms) to
understand: net, gross, thickness, pay, and reservoir.
Basically, pay means rock within the
hydrocarbon zone, reservoir means rock
capable of flowing any fluid, including water,
under ideal conditions, and net means rock that
exceeds various cutoffs defined by an analyst.
Put the terms together in various ways and you
can get (also see accompanying figures):
1) Gross thickness.This is customarily used to
refer to a lithologic or sequence stratigraphic
unit and doesn't have anything to do with
fluids. It simply represents all rock between the
top pick and bottom pick for a unit.
2) Net thickness.This is the total interval of
reservoir quality rock within the gross
thickness that is, rock that will flow fluids.
To be part of the net thickness, a rock's
properties must exceed some defined
thresholds, called cutoffs.The criteria for the
establishment of cutoffs can be a complex
subject by itself.

the reservoir) to the lowest point, which is

not necessarily the base of the reservoir (if a
hydrocarbon-water contact is present). As
with gross reservoir, though, this interval may
include non-reservoir and, therefore, low or
no hydrocarbon-saturation rock, but it is
often smaller than gross reservoir because of
the presence of water. (We ignore capillary
pressure and transition zone effects in this
article because they are a complication
unnecessary for the general understanding of
the terms of interest.)
6) Net pay. This is the total thickness of
reservoir quality rock that will flow some
amount of hydrocarbons from rock
exceeding user-determined cutoffs. It is the
sum of the thicknesses of the individual
reservoir quality beds within the gross pay
unit. (Again, imagine distilling off the nonreservoir rock and leaving behind only the
good stuff, but in this case not including rock
containing substantial amounts of water.)
So, what does a person mean when he says,
"net-to-gross ratio?" Guess what? You can't tell
without checking the gist of the conversation,
or the mapping if it is provided, because the
ratio could refer to thickness or to pay! One
supposes to be more informative we should
say net-to-gross thickness and net-to-gross
pay, but these terms are not widely used.

In our experience, the most common usage

of net-to-gross ratio among flow-simulation
engineers refers to net-thickness-to-grossthickness, because its main use in reservoir
flow simulators is to determine the volume
of rock holding a mobile fluid, whether gas,
oil, or water. (Flow simulators don't even
know about the non-flowing rock that may
be part of gross thickness; they ignore it. But
flow simulators care about flowing water as
much as about flowing hydrocarbons, because
it provides critically important pressure
support.) The actual volume of hydrocarbon
is then determined by taking into account the
hydrocarbon-water contact.
By contrast, within the context of reserves
calculations, net-to-gross ratio is usually the
ratio of net pay to one of the gross
parameters, because its main purpose is to
determine the hydrocarbons in place.
Confusion arises in this case because there is
no standard for whether the gross parameter
is gross thickness, gross reservoir, or gross
pay. It is easy to see how, without a clear
definition of the terms of reference or maps
clearly defining what volume of rock is in the
calculations, the net-to-gross ratio of one
individual may be misapplied by a second.
The terms in the third set net and gross
reservoir are subtle variations of the

3) Gross reservoir. This means the thickness

of the unit from the highest part to the
lowest part that is reservoir quality, but this
obviously can include tight rock (immobile
fluids) inter-bedded with reservoir quality
rock. Hence gross reservoir can be a subset
of gross thickness. Geologists often map this
instead of gross thickness, in which case it
substitutes for gross thickness.
4) Net reservoir.This is the total thickness of
reservoir quality rock within the gross
reservoir, and is therefore identical to the net
thickness defined above. It is the sum of the
thicknesses of the individual reservoir quality
beds within the gross unit. (Imagine distilling
off the non-reservoir rock and leaving behind
only the good stuff.) Although this is a more
descriptive term than net thickness, it is not
as widely used.
5) Gross pay. This is the thickness of rock
from the highest point of hydrocarbon
saturation (usually the base of the top seal of
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Example 1: A real data example

In this example of actual wireline data from western
Canada, we illustrate which portions of the formation
are Net Reservoir and which portions are Net Pay.
The Formation Top and Formation Base in this case are
regional chronostratigraphic surfaces, and do not
correspond to the top and the base of sands or of
reservoir quality rock. Between them is the Gross
Thickness interval. The Gross Reservoir interval is
between the Reservoir Top and Reservoir Base, and
includes water as well as oil zones, and impermeable
shales (brown, dashed Lithology zone) as well as

permeable sands (yellow, stippled Lithology zone),

trapped below an anhydrite layer (pink Lithology zone
at top).
An analyst has applied some cutoffs to break the gross
interval into three separate Net Reservoir intervals
(colored orange) by removing the shale breaks, but
ignoring the fluids. These three intervals are further
reduced to two Net Pay intervals (colored green) by
removing the water-bearing zone (colored blue with
wavy lines).

previous terms and are more commonly used

by geologists in describing the vertical limits
of the permeable reservoir rock, irrespective
of fluids.
Perhaps a larger point to keep in mind is that
net-to-gross ratio by itself is not even
interesting; it is just a conveyance to get to
net reservoir, or to net pay in the context of
reserve determinations. As long as you are
consistent in your meaning of net and gross
then your net-to-gross ratio will work. In
other words, you'd better be able to backcalculate your gross value using only your net
value and your net-to-gross ratio, or you are
most likely mixing net and gross definitions.
When it comes to calculating volume of
hydrocarbons a calculation necessary for
reserves certification it is only net pay that
matters. Perhaps someone would use net-togross pay to calculate net pay as an
intermediate step, but there is little intrinsic
value in the net-to-gross ratio itself. It is net
pay along with area, porosity, water
saturation, *formation volume factor, and
recovery factor that determines volume of
hydrocarbons in place and technically
recoverable hydrocarbons for economic
determinations.
* formation volume factor: the change in volume
of the hydrocarbon between reservoir conditions
and surface conditions.

the framework of integrated teams of

geophysicists, geologists, petrophysicists and
reservoir simulation engineers. Bruce currently
works for Core Laboratories in Calgary as a Staff
Simulation Engineer.

The authors would like to thank Mauro Cimolai

for his helpful comments.

low porosity, low permeability,

very low or no oil saturation,
non-reservoir
(upper seal)

A
1m

non-pay

high porosity, high permeability,

gross pay
high oil saturation,
and net pay
gross and net reservoir

B
2m

low porosity, low permeability,

very low or no oil saturation,
gross reservoir

gross pay

low porosity, low permeability,

very low or no oil saturation,
gross reservoir

gross pay

3m

D
4m

high porosity, high permeability,

gross pay
high oil saturation,
and net pay
gross and net reservoir

E
5m

high porosity, high permeability,

high water saturation,
gross and net reservoir

F
6m

non-pay

Depth
The authors welcome your comments:
netris@corelab.ca
Edward (Ned) Etris received M.Sc. (1987) and
Ph.D. (1991) degrees in geology from the
University of South Carolina. An experienced
reservoir characterization geologist and numerical
reservoir model developer, Ned has worked in oil
companies and consulting firms progressing from
research to development drilling and field
exploitation, with experience ranging from regional
prospecting to detailed reservoir characterization.
Currently Manager of Geologic Services at Core
Lab, he directs work on geological studies, timedepth conversion, 3D geological modeling, and
petrophysical studies, and plays a key role in
integrated
geophysical-geological-engineering
studies within the Reservoir Modeling Group.
bstewart@corelab.ca
Bruce Stewart completed his M.Eng. (1984)
Degree from the University of Calgary, and has
worked for several oil companies in Calgary and
overseas. His area of expertise is reservoir
characterization and reservoir modeling within

Rock

Water

Oil

Gross thickness = A+B+C+D+E+F = 6 m

Gross reservoir = B+C+D+E+F = 5 m
Gross pay = B+C+D+E = 4 m
Net thickness = Net reservoir = B+E+F = 3 m
Net pay = B+E = 2 m
*pressure continuity implies connectivity in 3D.
Note that this simplified example does not consider cut-offs,
transition zones, or bed thickness minima.

Example 2: Net-to-gross calculations

i. Using Gross Thickness: If the volume being
mapped is between top A and base F, then net-togross for simulation is (net thickness /gross
thickness) = 3/6 = 50%, whereas net-to-gross for
reserves is (net pay/gross thickness) = 2/6 = 33.3%.
ii. Using Gross Reservoir: If the volume being
mapped is between top B and base F, then net-togross for simulation is 3/5 = 60%, whereas net-togross for reserves is 2/5 = 40%.
iii. Using Gross Pay: If the volume being mapped is
between top B and base E, then net-to-gross for
simulation would be an untenable calculation
(because top B to base E leaves out a part of the
model critical to flow simulation: the pressure

support provided by water-saturated interval F). Netto-gross for reserves for this interval is 2/4 = 50%.
The bottom line: It is net pay and net thickness
that matter; net-to-gross ratios are just a way to get
to net values. In this example, the net-to-gross ratio
for reserves is variously 33.3%, 40%, or 50%,
depending on the volume being mapped, but the net
pay is always 2m.
In general, regardless of what kind of net-to-gross ratio
is used, whether it's net-thickness-to-gross-thickness
for flow simulations or net-pay-to-gross-pay for
reserves calculations: 1) keep your definitions straight,
and 2) the net pay and net reservoir thickness are not
necessarily equal.

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