Buenos Aires
Nov 13–14
The morning after DISC Lab in Mexico City, we hopped on a flight to the Southern Hemisphere. Nine hours later, we landed in Buenos Aires. Buenos Aires is a city that is alive with music, tango, and festivals. Being spring, the Jacarandas were in bloom, giving a pop of purple to the city streets.
We arrived in Argentina on Wednesday evening and had a few days to be tourists in Buenos Aires and prep for the DISC. On Thursday afternoon, we met up with Ana Curcio, our local host, at Cafe Tortoni and chatted about applications of EM that would be of interest to participants in Argentina (as well as highlights we shouldn’t miss during our time in Buenos Aires!… more to come later in the blog).
Day 1: DISC Course
The majority of participants were industry professionals in the hydrocarbon industry and for most geoscientists in the room, seismic methods were the main method of focus in their day-to-day work. Several graduate students and professors from the University of Buenos Aires, some with backgrounds in EM, also attended.
Thanks to Ana’s efforts communicating details of the course to all of the participants, everyone who attended Day 1 also planned to attend Day 2. This enabled us to take the course at a more moderate pace, particularly as most participants had little background in electromagnetic methods. This also allowed us to cover all of the methods, in many locations, we have had to skip the presentations on either Ground Penetrating Radar or Natural Source methods due to time-constraints.
We started Day 1 at 9am with introductions from participants and then presented the goals of the course and an introduction to electromagnetics and its applications. From there, we successively covered direct current resistivity, the fundamentals of electromagnetics, inductive sources (including case histories in groundwater and hydrocarbon applications) and finished off the day with grounded sources (including marine EM).
Empanadas were provided for the lunch break in the Pluspetrol offices — we always appreciate the when lunch is provided as it also gives us a chance to mingle and chat with more of the participants!
Day 2: DISC Lab
We picked up on day 2 with natural source methods. Magnetotellurics was of particular interest to many of the participants as several are involved in hydrocarbon exploration in Bolivia, where the target formation (the Huamampampa formation) is several kilometers beneath the surface. The significant tectonism and structure in the area makes the seismic very challenging to interpret. At this point, the potential of MT to play a role is still under investigation. A representative physical property model, followed by 3D numerical modelling is required to examine what information MT might bring to bear.
Following the wrap-up of the DISC course material, we turned the floor over to participants to discuss applications of EM they are working on.
Ana Curcio (slides), with Proingeo, started us off with a presentation connected to groundwater. The Guarani Aquifer is located beneath the surface of Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Brazil. It is the second largest known aquifer system in the world covering an area about half a million square kilometers; its thickness of 50–800m and the maximum depth is about 1800m. Characterizing this aquifer, particularly its thickness and depth, is important. Ana showed examples of using MT to get estimates of these parameters. The interpretation was aided by the existence of drill holes accompanied with geologic logs.
Emilia Muzzio (slides) — The venue for the DISC presentations was in a well-equipped room in Pluspetrol and we were pleased to hear a talk from Emilia, a geophysicist with Pluspetrol, about local hydrocarbon problems. The hydrocarbon areas for Argentina and Bolivia are characterized by large compressive anticlinal structures, but getting good geologic images from seismic surveys is problematic because of the complicated velocity model. MT surveys were carried out and the data inverted. The drilling of an exploratory well was in progress but, with the interpretation of the MT, it was decided to deviate the well to more directly intersect the sides of the anticline.
Liliana Curso (slides) — The area of Taco Ralo, at the eastern border of the Andes in Argentina, is an important geothermal resource that results from deep tectonic and magmatic activity. There is no surface volcanism but high temperature waters exist at depth. Liliana, a graduate student at University of Buenos Aires and her coworkers have acquired MT data over the region. Liliana’s research is focussed on inverting and interpreting those data. The work is in progress and is currently exploring the effects of topography on the MT inversions using the ModEM software.
Franco Macchioli Grande (slides), who is a PhD student at Facultad de Ciencias Astronómicas y Geofísicas, UNLP, is developing numerical algorithms for forward modelling and inversion of controlled EM sources, with particular application to marine problems. He’s using a primary/secondary field formulation and solving with finite elements. A stochastic framework is used for the inversion. His work is currently in 2D but he plans to extend the research to generate a 3D inversion.
Juanpablo Romero (slides) finished off the presentations for the day. South America has many historic buildings and archaeological sites where structures are to be determined and, sometimes, restored. An ancient church, built in 1752, and declared a heritage site in 1959, was one of the buildings that needed restoration. The church, located in the town of Santa Ana in Venezuela, had undergone many modifications over the centuries and the engineering challenge was to restore it. That presented many challenges because details about previous versions of the church were not available. From the engineers perspective, they wanted a least invasive technique to inform them about the potential of buried bodies, objects, and general structure. GPR was an obvious choice and Juanpablo, with the Universidad Central De Venezuela, was in charge of survey design and carrying out the acquisition and analysis. An interesting offshoot of this case history was how the interaction between a geophysicist, who understands the technique and strengths and limitations, and an engineer, who does not know the technology, communicate and build a mutual trust.
We wrapped up day 2 with an overview of resources available to participants, including EM GeoSci, a “textbook” resource on the fundamentals of electromagnetics and SimPEG, open source software for simulations and inversions, as well as ways to keep in touch through the GeoSci slack channel and the SimPEG Google group.
From the Participants
“It has been very interesting to get to know the advances in EM methods and the perspective of [their] usage in the future. The use of web simulation tools makes a great difference in understanding the fundamentals of each case.” — Juanpablo Romero, Geophysicist
“It was very useful, especially for recognizing the advantages and limitations of each technique discussed. It’s great to see real examples and applications” — Juan Ignacio Gómez, Geophysicist
“[The course] has a lot of value. You brought enthusiasm for communicating the power of EM methods. I hope all of the audiences have appreciated it! The course is well structured and encouraged us all to think. Perhaps it is a bit long for one or two days, but EM is a huge topic for two days only!” — Franco Macchioli Grande, PhD student
All of the material from the course is available at: https://disc2017.geosci.xyz/buenos-aires.
A few adventures
We landed in Buenos Aires on Wednesday night and the DISC was scheduled for the following Monday and Tuesday, so the weekend gave us a couple extra free days to do a bit of catch-up on emails, but mostly to explore the city and find out what it has to offer!
Thursday
On Thursday, our first full day in Buenos Aires, we went out for a walk to explore the neighbourhood around our accommodation and stopped along the way for some empanadas at a local Parrilla. We also stopped by a produce shop to pick up some fresh fruits and vegetables (to balance out all of the beef!). That afternoon, we met up with Ana at Cafe Tortoni, an iconic cafe that also hosts Tango shows in the evenings. We chatted about applications of geophysics in Argentina as well as what some of the highlights to see during our time in Buenos Aires.
That evening, Ana had made reservations for all of us to attend a show at Tango Porteno. The evening started off with a lesson on the tango basic steps; this was followed by steak dinner (when in Argentina!) and the spectacular show.
Friday
On Friday, we did a self-guided walking tour. We started off in San Telmo, the area we were staying in. San Telmo is the oldest neighbourhood in Buenos Aires; its cobblestone streets are lined with antique shops and parrillas (traditional Argentinian barbecues). It is also home to the Modern Art museum. On the top floor of the museum, there was a dark room which you could walk around the perimeter of. The rest of the room was filled with by the exhibition: the wold’s largest indoor spider web. It was built by eighteen colonies of spiders over 4 months — quite spectacular!
From there, we made our way through Parque Lezama towards the La Boca neighbourhood of Buenos Aires. La Boca is home to the famous street: El Caminito that is lined with brightly coloured buildings; the area buzzes with music and art (and a few tourist traps, as with any iconic spot)!
We finished off the day in Argentinian style. That evening, we went to a Des Nivel, a parrilla recommended to us by our airbnb host. We ordered a couple steaks and headed out with plenty of left-overs.
Saturday
Going to a cemetery hardly seems like a tourist attraction, but visiting the Recoleta cemetery was recommended to us by a number of people. So Saturday, we headed to Recoleta. There are thousands of mausoleums there, including some famous figures such as Eva Perón, some command your attention while others seemed much more personal. It is a truly unique site.
Following our visit to Recoleta, we wandered through the street market outside the cemetery, stopping for a Choripan (chorizo sandwich with grilled veggies — quite tasty!). We started walking towards the museum of Latin American Art, which hosts art from Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera. After seeing the long line-up to get in, we decided to instead continue walking the streets, photograph some of the Jacarandas in their beautiful, purple bloom, and stop to listen to music at some of the Saturday street festivals.
On Ana’s recommendation, we spent the rest of the afternoon and in to the evening at a street food festival (thanks Ana!!). Inside, there was a market where you could buy (and sample!) local produce, cheese, meats, tea’s, … Outside, there were dozens and dozens of food stands and food trucks. We sampled Buñuelos (corn fritters), Proveleta (an Argentinian staple at many parrillas. It is fried provolone cheese — can’t go wrong with that!), and a beef Arepa. We certainly didn’t go home hungry.
Sunday
Sunday was our last day before the DISC. After a bit of prep for the course, we headed out to meet up with Ana. We met at a Sunday market near Plaza de Mayo, the town square famous for marking Argentinian independence. The sight-lines draw your attention to the Pirámide de Mayo, which was erected on the one-year anniversary of Argentinian Independence, and just beyond that, the Presidential Palace. At the other end of the plaza is history museum, which we spent some time walking through. From there, we made our way to see the English clock tower.
Our last stop of the day was the Sunday market at Plaza Dorrego. Doug came home with a new apron, and I came back with a new scarf! As the market was wrapping up, we sat down for a pizza dinner and once the stalls were down, we enjoyed listening to music, and watching as people filled the square to dance tango in the street. It was a wonderful way to end our tourist time in Argentina.
Thanks
Ana was an exceptionally enthusiastic local host! We are very grateful to her for getting the word out to participants and for the time she took to show us a wonderful time in Buenos Aires.
Thanks also to Pluspetrol for providing the facility and technical support for running the course in Buenos Aires.
