Semi-analytical response of acoustic logging measurements in frequency domain

This work proposes a semi-analytical method for simulation of the acoustic response of multipole eccentered sources in a fluid-filled borehole. Assuming a geometry that is invariant with respect to the azimuthal and vertical directions, the solution in frequency domain is expressed in terms of a Fourier series and a Fourier integral. The proposed semi-analytical method builds upon the idea of separating singularities from the smooth part of the integrand when performing the inverse Fourier transform. The singular part is treated analytically using existing inversion formulae, while the regular part is treated with a FFT technique. As a result, a simple and effective method that can be used for simulating and understanding the main physical principles occurring in borehole-eccentered sonic measurements is obtained. Numerical results verify the proposed method and illustrate its advantages

Gas hydrate technology: state of the art and future possibilities for Europe

Interest in natural gas hydrates has been steadily increasing over the last few decades, with the understanding that exploitation of this abundant unconventional source may help meet the ever-increasing energy demand and assist in reduction of CO2 emission (by replacing coal). Unfortunately, conventional technologies for oil and gas exploitation are not fully appropriate for the specific exploitation of gas hydrate. Consequently, the technology chain, from exploration through production to monitoring, needs to be further developed and adapted to the specific properties and conditions associated with gas hydrates, in order to allow for a commercially and environmentally sound extraction of gas from gas hydrate deposits. Various academic groups and companies within the European region have been heavily involved in theoretical and applied research of gas hydrate for more than a decade. To demonstrate this, Fig. 1.1 shows a selection of leading European institutes that are actively involved in gas hydrate research. A significant number of these institutes have been strongly involved in recent worldwide exploitation of gas hydrate, which are shown in Fig. 1.2 and summarized in Table 1.1. Despite the state of knowledge, no field trials have been carried out so far in European waters. MIGRATE (COST action ES1405) aims to pool together expertise of a large number of European research groups and industrial players to advance gas-hydrate related activity with the ultimate goal of preparing the setting for a field production test in European waters. This MIGRATE report presents an overview of current technologies related to gas hydrate exploration (Chapter 2), production (Chapter 3) and monitoring (Chapter 4), with an emphasis on European activity. This requires covering various activities within different disciplines, all of which contribute to the technology development needed for future cost-effective gas production. The report points out future research and work areas (Chapter 5) that would bridge existing knowledge gaps, through multinational collaboration and interdisciplinary approaches

Airborne sound propagation over sea during offshore wind farm piling

Offshore piling for wind farm construction has attracted a lot of attention in recent years due to the extremely high noise emission levels associated with such operations. While underwater noise levels were shown to be harmful for the marine biology, the propagation of airborne piling noise over sea has not been studied in detail before. In this study, detailed numerical calculations have been performed with the Green's Function Parabolic Equation (GFPE) method to estimate noise levels up to a distance of 10 km. Measured noise emission levels during piling of pinpiles for a jacket-foundation wind turbine were assessed and used together with combinations of the sea surface state and idealized vertical sound speed profiles (downwind sound propagation). Effective impedances were found and used to represent non-flat sea surfaces at low-wind sea states 2, 3, and 4. Calculations show that scattering by a rough sea surface, which decreases sound pressure levels, exceeds refractive effects, which increase sound pressure levels under downwind conditions. This suggests that the presence of wind, even when blowing downwind to potential receivers, is beneficial to increase the attenuation of piling sound over the sea. A fully flat sea surface therefore represents a worst-case scenario

Bridges Structural Health Monitoring and Deterioration Detection Synthesis of Knowledge and Technology

INE/AUTC 10.0

Fast 2.5D Finite Element Simulations of Borehole Resistivity Measurements

We develop a rapid 2.5-dimensional (2.5D) finite element method for simulation of borehole resistivity measurements in transversely isotropic (TI) media. The method combines arbitrary high-order $H^1$ - and $H$ (curl)-conforming spatial discretizations. It solves problems where material properties remain constant along one spatial direction, over which we consider a Fourier series expansion and each Fourier mode is solved independently. We propose a novel a priori method to construct quasi-optimal discretizations in physical and Fourier space. This construction is based on examining the analytical (fundamental) solution of the 2.5D formulation over multiple homogeneous spaces and assuming that some of its properties still hold for the 2.5D problem over a spatially heterogeneous formation. In addition, a simple parallelization scheme over multiple measurement positions provides efficient scalability. Our method yields accurate borehole logging simulations for realistic synthetic examples, delivering simulations of borehole resistivity measurements at a rate faster than 0.05 s per measurement location along the well trajectory on a 96-core computer

Analysis of borehole guided waves for geotechnical application

The reliability of Stoneley waves (SWs) is discussed for the characterisation of the mechanical properties of soft and hard rock in borehole seismic techniques using source on the surface and hydrophones as receivers. The SWs propagate along the fluid-filled borehole; the propagation is affected by the mechanical and hydraulic properties of the fluid and the surrounding medium. At low frequencies, in a non-diffusive medium (impermeable formation), the wave velocity depends on the density, the wave velocity of the fluid and the shear modulus of the formation. The models adopted to infer the wave velocity in elastic formations in uncased and cased boreholes are discussed. We discuss two examples to check the discrepancies between the theoretical and the experimental evidence. The presence of casing in soft rock greatly reduces the sensitivity of the SW propagation to the mechanical properties of the medium. In hard rock, the scattering of the primary wavefields could be adopted to detect the presence of rock mass discontinuities (fractures). © 2007 - OGS

Dispersion of flexural waves in a borehole with a tensile fracture in an anisotropic stress environment

The effect of tensile fracture in a vertical borehole under anisotropic horizontal stress conditions is numerically investigated in terms of the dispersion of flexural wave generated in dipole sonic logging. Our three-dimensional model comprises a borehole filled with water and a tensile fracture intersecting the borehole in the borehole axial direction. Two shear waves are excited individually to produce particle displacements polarized in two orthogonal radial directions using two dipole sources aligned in the two polarized directions. A vertical array of equispaced dipole sensors is placed at the centre of the borehole along the borehole axis. We assumed that the surrounding formation possesses transversally isotropic anisotropy with the isotropy plane parallel to the borehole axis due to horizontal stress anisotropy. We examined the dispersion of flexural waves travelling along a borehole in our numerical models that include either fast or slow formation with various depths of tensile fractures. Our numerical results show that the deeper the penetration depth of a tensile fracture, the higher the slowness of shear waves polarized perpendicular to the tensile fracture for both slow and fast formation models. Our results indicate that the flexural dispersion behaviour could be used to investigate the depth of penetration of a tensile fracture that can be produced by either drilling or hydraulic fracturing

Diagnosis of Multi-Stage Fracture Stimulation in Horizontal Wells by Downhole Temperature Measurements

Fractured well performance diagnosis for a multiple-stage fractured horizontal well is critical to understand and improve fracture stimulation design. Temperature distribution data (by production logging tools or fiber-optic sensors) is one of the valuable information for performance diagnosis. However, until today quantitative interpretation of dynamic temperature data is still challenging and requires in-depth mathematical modeling of heat and mass transfer during production in a complex flow system. The interpretation models developed to translate temperature data to flow conditions can be fully numerical-based simulations or analytical/semi-analytical approaches. With reasonable assumptions analytical/semi-analytical models are more suitable for real-time field applications. This dissertation presents the applications of using a coupled semi-analytical fracture model and a wellbore model to predict the temperature and pressure behavior in multiple-fractured horizontal wells in unconventional reservoirs during production. The thermal model calculated heat transfer in the fracture/reservoir/wellbore system considering subtle temperature changes caused by the Joule-Thomson cooling effect. The results showed that the wellbore fluid temperature behavior is sensitive to the flow condition, and can be used to estimate fracture initiation points, number of created fractures and flow profile along the horizontal wellbore. This dissertation discusses the characteristics of transient temperature behaviors corresponding to different wellbore constraints, and also the fracture volume which influence the flow rate/temperature distribution along a fractured horizontal wellbore. The temperature drop when gas entering the wellbore is more obvious at the toe and is weaken towards the heel with the uniform inflow rate distribution due to the fluid mixing inside the wellbore. Field cases are presented to illustrate the application of using the temperature model to understand the fracture/flow distribution. The estimation of flow rate distribution from the temperature model is compared to the interpretation of flow by production logging tools (PLT) and commercial software. The flow profile from the temperature model presents consistent trend with PLT measurement. It is more sensitive to the fluid entries (fracture locations) and less sensitive to the influence of flow regime inside the wellbore when compared with the interpretation from array production logging tools. The fast marching method (FMM) is presented in this study to get the thermal map near hydraulic/natural fractures. This method solves the front tracking problems efficiently. By doing so, we can consider a heterogeneity formation with fractures, and also complex fracture geometry compared with analytical solution. It is also superior in visibility of stimulated reservoir volume (SRV) and in computational efficiency compared to finite difference simulation

Acoustic Waveform Logging - Advances In Theory And Application

Full-waveform acoustic logging has made significant advances in both theory and application in recent years, and these advances have greatly increased the capability of log analysts to measure the physical properties of formations. Advances in theory provide the analytical tools required to understand the properties of measured seismic waves, and to relate those properties to such quantities as shear and compressional velocity and attenuation, and primary and fracture porosity and permeability of potential reservoir rocks. The theory demonstrates that all parts of recorded waveforms are related to various modes of propagation, even in the case of dipole and quadrupole source logging. However, the theory also indicates that these mode properties can be used to design velocity and attenuation picking schemes, and shows how source frequency spectra can be selected to optimize results in specific applications. Synthetic microseismogram computations are an effective tool in waveform interpretation theory; they demonstrate how shear arrival picks and mode attenuation can be used to compute shear velocity and intrinsic attenuation, and formation permeability for monopole, dipole and quadrupole sources. Array processing of multi-receiver data offers the opportunity to apply even more sophisticated analysis techniques. Synthetic microseismogram data is used to illustrate the application of the maximum-likelihood method, semblance cross-correlation, and Prony's method analysis techniques to determine seismic velocities and attenuations. The interpretation of acoustic waveform logs is illustrated by reviews of various practical applications, including synthetic seismogram generation, lithology determination, estimation of geomechanical properties in situ, permeability estimation, and design of hydraulic fracture operations