Guided waves in a borehole embedded in a non-Newtonian

fluid-saturated porous solid

Ke-Xie Wang, Jin-Xia Liu & Zhi-Wen Cui

School of Physics, Jilin University, Changchun, Jilin, China

ABSTRACT: Propagation of guided waves in a fluid-filled cylindrical bore surrounded by non-Newtonian

(Maxwell) fluid-saturated porous media for pore size distribution is investigated. We investigate the influence of
non-Newtonian effects on acoustic guided waves propagation in a fluid-filled cylindrical bore by calculating the
acoustic partial waveforms and the curves of velocity dispersion, and attenuation coefficients of the fundamental
guided waves excited by a monopole, a dipole and a quadrupole source. The results are also compared with those
based on generalized Biots theory with considering pore size distribution. The results indicate that the influence
of non-Newtonian effects on acoustic guided waves, especially on the attenuation of guided waves propagation
in borehole is noticeable.

1 INTRODUCTION other phase is a fluid filling the voids. We describe the

Acoustic logs are important measurements to pro-
vide useful information about in situ properties of
formations. Hydrocarbon exploration is especially
concerned with porous formation. In most previous
works of the borehole wave propagation, the perme-
able formation around the fluid borehole is assumed to
be Newton fluid saturated porous media. Biot theory
(Biot 1956) treated energy dissipation due to relative
motion between a viscous pore fluid and the solid
framework of porous material. Many authors (Schmitt
et al. 1988, Zhang et al. 1995) have studied the proper-
ties of elastic waves propagation in the fluid borehole
using Biots theory. However, oil and other hydro-
carbons exhibit significant non-Newtonian behavior
(Tsiklauri 2003). The main purpose of this paper
is to investigate the influence of the non-Newtonian
effects on the guided waves propagation in the bore-
hole. Based on the generalized Biot-Tsiklauri model
(Cui et al. 2003) with a no-slip boundary, we exam-
ine the effects of non-Newtonian (Maxwell) fluid on
guided waves propagation of the fluid-filled bore-
hole. Acoustic partial waveforms and the curves of
velocity dispersion, and attenuation coefficients of the
fundamental guided waves are investigated.
2 THEORETICAL FORMULATIONS
In Biots theory, a fluid-saturated porous medium is
regarded as an interacting two-phase elastic system,
one phase of which is a porous solid skeleton and the
viscoelastic effect of the fluid filling the voids using
Maxwells model, which assumes that
where is the viscosity coefficient, tm is the relax-
ation time (m denotes Maxwell) and v denotes the
velocity of the fluid, whereas represents the viscous
stress tensor. We consider that the local relative flow
is incompressible (v = 0). The equations of motion
in the porous formation are (Cui et al. 2003)
here H , M , C and G are the Biots elastic coefficients
that replace the usual Lam coefficients, their expres-
sions as functions of the bulk moduli of the constitutive
grains Ks , the skeleton Kb , and the fluid Kf , the shear
modulus of the skeleton G. w = (uf u) represents
the flow of the fluid relative to solid and is measured in
the terms of volume per unit area of the bulk medium,
where uf and u are the absolute displacements of the
pore fluid and solid phase of a porous medium, respec-
tively. is a total porosity. The density of bulk can be
expressed by the density of grain s and pore fluid f as
= (1 ) s + f m = i/k() is the effective

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Copyright 2005 Taylor & Francis Group plc, London, UK
density of the fluid in relative motion. Biots dynamic
permeability k() can be expressed as
Here k() describes the response of the fluid-saturated
porous medium to an applied stimulus, and character-
izes the frequency-dependent behaviour of pore fluid
flow. Fm () is the viscosity correction factor, which is
generalized to the case of a non-Newtonian (Maxwell)
fluid with arbitrary pore size distribution. It measures
the deviation from Poiseuille flow friction as a function
of the frequency.
where
This paper does not consider the slip boundary.
c = /f k0 is Biots transition frequency. 0 is
effective permeability of porous media, which can
be obtained by k0 = 2
0 (/8)a f (a) da. a is pore
radius. f (a) is a radial probability density distribution
function.
Let (r,,z) be the cylindrical coordinate sys-
tem. The model consists of a fluid filled borehole
of radius a, extending to infinity in the z direc-
tion, embedded in a radially semiinfinite isotropic
porous formation saturated by a non-Newtonian
(Maxwell) fluid. We consider multipole point sources
described by Schmitt(1988). Usually, the receivers are
listed in the axis of the borehole (r = 0). Following
Zhang et al.(1995) & Schmitt (1988a), An (k, ) = Nn
(k, )/Dn (k, ) is the generalized reflection coeffi-
cient determined by the boundary condition. Nn (k, )
and Dn (k, ) are the numerator and denominator of
the reflection coefficients (A0n ),respectively. The char-
acteristic equation is given as |Dn (k, )| = 0. For a
certain frequency, it gives the axis-wavenumber of
guided wave propagation along the direction of the
axis of the borehole, its root is corresponding to the
pole kl (l = 1, 2, 3) of the reflection coefficient A0n .
The amplitude of the guided wave excited by a source
is given by
So the pressure of partial waves can be expressed
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Copyright 2005 Taylor & Francis Group plc, London, UK
Any pole corresponds at a given frequency to a com-
plex wavenumber root [kl = Re(kl ) + iIm(kl )] of the
period equation. The phase velocity of the mode is
equal to /Re(kl ), while its attenuation is equal to
2Im(kl )/Re(kl ), then the group velocity is obtain by
numerical differentiation from /Re(kl ).
3 NUMERICAL RESULTS
In the following, we calculated the acoustic partial
waveforms and the curves of velocity dispersion, and
attenuation coefficients of the fundamental guided
waves due to a monopole, a dipole and a quadrupole
source. The pore size a is given in m and in units.
Note, = ln a (a in mm). The pore radius probability
density distribution function is
where = ln a and 2 are the mean and variance of
log-transformed pore radius (ln a) respectively. a is
the median pore radius. The distribution of -normal
standard is similar to the reference (Yamamoto 1988).
We select the parameters as in reference (Cui & Wang
2003): Kf = 2.25 GPa, Ks = 38 GPa, Kb = 16 Gpa,
G = 14.61 GPa, f = 1500 Kg/m3 , s = 2650 Kg/m3 ,
= 0.1, = 0.001 Pa s. = 0 corresponds to the case
that all pore radii have the same size. = 0 corre-
sponds to the distribution of -normal standard. In this
paper, we choose a = 6.3 m and = 0.7. Here, we
use De to denote the Deborah number, which is defined
as the ratio of the characteristic time viscous effect
tv = a2 f / to the relaxation time tm . It is the Deborah
number that determines in which regime the system
resides. For a small De, the system exhibits a vis-
coelastic behaviour, which we call the non-Newtonian
regime. When De = (i.e. tm = 0), this study corre-
sponds to the generalized Biot theory with pore size
distribution developed by Yamamoto & Turgut (1988).
Figure 1 gives the phase velocity, group veloc-
ity and the attenuation of the two types of guided
waves excited by a monopole (axisymmetric) for three
cases. The solid curve corresponds to De = i.e. the
Newtonian fluid-saturated case with pore size distri-
bution, the dashed and the dashed-dot curves represent
the non-Newtonian cases De = 10 and De = 1, respec-
tively. The first axisymmetric mode is the stoneley
wave or the tube wave. The tube wave exists at all fre-
quencies . This wave exhibits a slight dispersion and
its energy is usually highest at low frequencies. The
second axisymmetric mode is the pseudo-Rayleigh
modes (Fig.1, we only show the fundamental modes,
the higher modes is not plotted), which has in this
case a cut-off frequency. At this cut-off frequency, the
mode reaches its highest phase velocity, namely the
 1.6 (a) 1.6 Flex (a)
pR1 Phase
De = De =
Normalized velocity

Normalized velocity
1.4 De = 10 1.4 De = 10
De = 1 phase De = 1
1.2
1.2

group 1.0
1.0 Sto
group
phase 0.8
0.8
group
0.6
0 5 10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20
Frequency(KHZ) Frequency(kHz)
0.14
(b) (b)
0.12 Flex
Attenuation coefficients

Attenuation coefficients
De =
De =
De = 10 0.10
0.1 De = 10
De = 1
Sto De = 1
0.08

0.06

pR1 0.04

0.01 0.02

0 5 10 15 20 5 10 15 20
Frequency(KHZ) Frequency(KHZ)

Figure 1. Dispersion curves (a) and attenuation coefficients Figure 2. Dispersion curves (a) and attenuation coefficients
(b) of guided waves excited by monopole point source. (b) of guided waves excited by dipole point sources. Velocity
Velocity is normalized by the velocity of borehole fluid. is normalized by the velocity of borehole fluid.

shear wave velocity of the solid. As the frequency of
the waves increases, the phase velocity of the mode
approaches the fluid velocity asymptotically-from
above. As the De decreases, only in the deeply non-
Newtonian regime, the values of phase velocity and
group velocity of the two types of guide waves have
a little change. Namely, the effect of non-Newtonian
on velocity of the two type of guide is small. How-
ever, the attenuation coefficients of the tube wave
have an overall increase in intermediate frequency,
especially in the deeply non-Newtonian regime. The
attenuation coefficients of pseudo-Rayleigh modes in
the deeply non-Newtonian regime is obviously much
higher than those predicted by Biots model. This
means that the influence of non-Newtonian effects
on attenuation coefficients of the two types of guided
waves is obviously.
Figure 2 shows the dispersion and attenuation of
the flexural mode excited by a dipole point source for
three cases as figure 1. The flexural waves (flex.) are
associated with a pure bending of the borehole. We
can find that the dispersion curves of flexural mode
have a little change only in the deeply non-Newtonian
regime. However, the attenuation coefficients in the
deeply non-Newtonian regime are much higher than
those in the Newtonian fluid-saturated case at inter-
mediate frequency, which comes to our notice even in
the general non-Newtonian regime (De = 10).
Figure 3 shows the dispersion and attenuation of the
screw mode excited by a quadrupole point source for
three cases as figure 1. The dispersion and attenuation
of the screw mode are analogous to those of the flexu-
ral mode except to a shift toward to higher frequency.
We can find that the dispersion curves of flexural
mode have a little change only in the deeply non-
Newtonian regime. However, the attenuations in the
deeply non-Newtonian regime are much higher than
those in the Newtonian fluid-saturated case at interme-
diate frequency, which also comes to our notice even in
the general non-Newtonian regime (De = 10). These
results show that the influence of non-Newtonian
effects on attenuations of guided waves is noticeable.
Figure 4(a) shows the partial waves of the stone-
ley wave with 9 kHz source center frequency for
three cases. The dot curves correspond to the Newto-
nian limit when De = , while thin and thick solid
curves represent the non-Newtonian cases De = 10
and De = 1, respectively. In the Figure 4 we find that
the arrival time of stoneley waves is nearly same for
that based on non-Newtonian fluid-saturated case and

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Copyright 2005 Taylor & Francis Group plc, London, UK
 1.6 (a) 0.4 (a)
screw De =
Sto De =
De = 10
Normalized velocity

1.4 0.2 De = 10
phase De = 1
De = 1

pressure
1.2 0.0

1.0 -0.2

group
0.8 -0.4

5 10 15 20 1 2 3
Frequency(KHZ) Time (ms)
0.14
screw (b) 1.5 De = (b)
0.12 De = 10
De =
Attenuation coefficients

1.0
De = 10 De = 1
0.10
De = 1 0.5

Pressure
0.08
0.0
0.06 PR1
-0.5
0.04 -1.0
0.02 -1.5

5 10 15 20 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0

Frequency(KHZ) Times(ms)

Figure 3. Dispersion curves (a) and attenuation coefficients Figure 4. The partial waveforms excited by monopole point
(b) of guided waves excited by quadrupole point sources. source. (a) the stoneley wave with 9 kHz source center fre-
Velocity is normalized by the velocity of borehole fluid. quency (b) the pseudo-Rayleigh wave with 10 kHz source
center frequency.

Newtonian fluid-saturated case. However, as the De

decreases, the amplitude of stoneley wave becomes 3
small, especially in the deeply non-Newtonian regime. Flex (a)
2 De=
Figure 4(b) shows the partial waves of the pseudo- De=10
Rayleigh wave with 10 kHz source center frequency De=1
for the three cases as figure 4(a). We also find that the 1
pressure

arrival time of pseudo-Rayleigh wave is not almost

0
change. But the amplitude of the pseudo-Rayleigh
wave in the deeply non-Newtonian regime are much -1
smaller than those in the Newtonian fluid-saturated
case, which becomes small even in the general non- -2
Newtonian regime (De = 10). These are consistent
with the dispersion and the attenuation curves in -3
Figure 1. 1 2 3 4
Figure 5 shows the partial waves of the flexural Time(ms)
mode with 4 kHz source center frequency for three
cases as figure 4. The arrival time of flexural mode is Figure 5. The partial waveforms excited by a dipole point
nearly same for that based on the non-Newtonian and source with 4 kHz source center frequency.
the Newtonian case. As the De decreases, the ampli-
tude of the flexural waves becomes small. These are
consistent with the curves of the dispersion and the has a little change only in the deeply non-Newtonian,
attenuation (see Figure 2). which is consistent with the curve of the dispersion.
In the Figure 6 we plot the partial waves of the Moreover, as De decreases, the amplitudes of the
screw mode with 10 kHz source center frequency for screw mode are obviously small, which also comes to
three cases as Figure 4. The arrival time of screw wave our notice even in the general non-Newtonian regime

244
Copyright 2005 Taylor & Francis Group plc, London, UK
 5 influence of squirt flow on fundamental guided waves
4 De =
3 De = 10 screw
De = 1
2
pressure
1
0
-1
-2
-3
-4
-5
1 2
Time(ms)
Figure 6. The partial waveforms excited by a quadrupole
point source with 10 kHz source center frequency.
(De = 10). These results show that the effect of non-
Newtonian may be the other factor of the guided waves
attenuation.
4 CONCLUSIONS
In the present paper, based on the generalized Biot-
Tsiklauri model with a no-slip boundary, we inves-
tigated the influence of non-Newtonian effects on
guided waves propagation of the fluid-filled bore-
hole. We investigated their acoustic partial waveforms
and the curves of velocity dispersion, and attenuation
coefficients of the fundamental guided waves due to
a monopole, a dipole and a quadrupole source. The
results show that non-Newtonian fluid effect in the sat-
urated porous solid may be one other important factor
that influences on acoustic guided waves in borehole.
In particular, the effect of non-Newtonian on attenu-
ation of guide waves is obvious even in the general
non-Newtonian regime (De = 10). It is more signif-
icant to narrow down the discrepancy between the
attenuation of theory prediction and the obtained data
in field. Although the velocity dispersions have a little
change only in the deeply non-Newtonian regime, their
changes are more distinct than those induced by the
Copyright 2005 Taylor & Francis Group plc, London, UK
(b) (Cui 2004). Therefore, this study shows that it may
need to be considered the effects of non-Newtonian
(Maxwell) in the interpretation of acoustic logging
data.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This work was supported by Doctoral Foundation of
Ministry of Education of China (20030183052) and
the National Natural Science Foundation of China
3 (40374043). The authors would like to thank Dr Ma
Jun for his interesting suggestions.
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