Numerical study of the anisotropy of wave responses from a fractured reservoir using the grid-characteristic method

Abstract

This work is aimed at studying the problem of subsurface disturbance propagation in a mas sive rock containing various inhomogeneities: empty or filled cracks. Numerical solutions to the prob lems of wave propagation in such substantially inhomogeneous media have been obtained. The depen dence that the parameters of the response from a fractured reservoir have on the problem parameters is studied. The latter parameters are the density of the crack location, the fractured reservoir extent, amount of cracks, the initial disturbance location, crack inclination, and disturbance frequency. The concept of response anisotropy is introduced and the dependence that the anisotropy has on the abovementioned parameters is studied. The grid characteristic method based on triangular meshes with the boundary conditions at the inter face between the rock and crack and at free surfaces is used in an explicit form. The proposed numer ical method can be used by studying the processes of interaction between seismic waves and inhomo geneous inclusions because it allows us to design most correctly the calculation algorithms at the inter faces between the integration domain and the media.