SBIR Phase I: Inversion of Geophysical Measurements for Fracture Geometry

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This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project will develop an innovative method for detecting and quantifying natural fracture systems in rock. The geometry of fracture systems controls the permeability of many oil and gas reservoir rocks. Many of the same aspects of geometry which control the fluid permeability also control the geophysical response. This project is to develop methods to invert geophysical measurements in fractured rock for the underlying fracture geometry, thus allowing prediction of permeability.Several forward models have been developed relating fracture geometry to various anisotropic, stress- dependent properties including permeability, electrical conductivity, and seismic velocity. These forward models will be used as the basis for developing an inverse method for obtaining the fracture geometry from diverse geophysical measurements. This inversion scheme will be modeled after an existing successful method for inversion of rock pore structure from constraining laboratory measurements. An inversion method for fracture properties will be implemented by inserting forward models specific to the fracture problem into the same inversion code previously developed for rock pore structure. This initial method will be tested for robustness and internal consistency using photographic image data from natural fracture networks.Software developed under Phases I and II of this project will provide the needed inputs for dual-porosity fractured reservoir simulators from diverse constraining geophysical data. This software will be invaluable for exploration and production activities in the oil and gas industry.