SOUTHWEST RESEARCH INSTITUTE

Abstract

Compressional waves in heterogeneous permeable media experience attenuation from both scattering and induced pore scale flow of the viscous saturating fluid. 

For a real, finely-sampled sedimentary sequence consisting of 255 layers and covering 30 meters of depth, elastic and poroelastic computer models are applied to investigate the relative importance of scattering and fluid-flow attenuation. The computer models incorporate the known porosity, permeability, and elastic properties of the sand/shale sequence in a binary medium, plane layered structure. The modeled elastic scattering attenuation is well described by stochastic medium theory if two-length scale statistics are applied to reflect the relative thickness of the shale layers when compared to the sand layers. 

Under the poroelastic Biot/squirt flow model, fluid-flow attenuation from the moderate permeability (10–14 m²) sands may be separated in the frequency domain from the attenuation due to the low permeability (5 × 10–17 m²) shale layers.  Based on these models, the overall attenuation is well approximated by the sum of the scattering attenuation from stochastic medium theory and the volume weighted average of the attenuations of the sequence member rocks. These results suggest that a high permeability network of sediments or fractures in a lower permeability host rock may have a distinct separable attenuation signature, even if the overall volume of high permeability material is low. Depending on the viscosity of the saturating fluid, the magnitude of the flow-based attenuation can dominate or be dominated by the scattering attenuation at typical sonic logging frequencies (~10 kHz).

For more information about the analysis of multiscale scattering and poroelastic attenuation in a real sedimentary rock sequence, or how you can contract with Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), please contact Jorge O. Parra, Ph.D., at jparra@swri.org or (210) 522-3284.

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December 28, 2012