Acoustic multi-modality inversion for cement integrity analysis

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10138727-B2
Application number	US-201414170427-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jan 31, 2014
Priority date	Jan 31, 2014
Publication date	Nov 27, 2018
Grant date	Nov 27, 2018

Abstract

Apparatus and method for characterizing a barrier installed in a borehole traversing a formation including locating an acoustic tool with a receiver and a transmitter at a location in the borehole, activating the acoustic tool to form acoustic waveforms, wherein the receiver records the acoustic waveforms, and processing the waveforms to identify barrier parameters as a function of azimuth and depth along the borehole, wherein the waveforms comprise at least two of sonic signals, ultrasonic pulse-echo signals, and ultrasonic pitch-catch signals.

First claim

We claim:

1. A method for characterizing a physical barrier comprising a plurality of casings and a plurality of annular fills installed in a borehole traversing a formation, the method comprising:
locating an acoustic tool with at least one receiver and at least one transmitter at a location in the borehole, wherein the acoustic tool is configured to perform at least two of (i) sonic measurements, (ii) ultrasonic pulse-echo measurements, and (iii) ultrasonic pitch-catch measurements of the physical barrier;
using the at least one transmitter of the acoustic tool, generating at least two types of acoustic waveforms that interact with the plurality of casings and the plurality of annular fills of the physical barrier, wherein the at least two types of acoustic waveforms comprise at least two of (i) sonic waveforms, (ii) ultrasonic pulse echo waveforms, wherein the at least one transmitter is oriented normal to the physical barrier, and (iii) ultrasonic pitch-catch waveforms, wherein the at least one transmitter is oriented at one or more angles to excite at least one mode within the physical barrier;
using the at least one receiver of the acoustic tool, recording resulting waveforms that result from the interaction of the at least two types of acoustic waveforms with the plurality of casings and the plurality of annular fills of the physical barrier to obtain at least two types of acoustic waveform data, wherein the at least two types of acoustic waveform data comprise at least two of (i) sonic waveform data, (ii) ultrasonic pulse-echo waveform data, and (iii) ultrasonic pitch-catch waveform data; and
processing the at least two types of acoustic waveform data using an inversion to determine barrier parameters as a function of azimuth and depth along the borehole.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the annular fill comprises cement.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the barrier comprises surfaces between the formation and the cement.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the barrier parameters comprise at least one of (i) barrier wavespeeds, (ii) bond compliance at a casing-cement interface, (iii) bond compliance at a cement-formation interface, (iv) indications of barrier abnormalities, and (v) combinations thereof.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the processing comprises upscaling the barrier parameters obtained with ultrasonic data processing to a sonic spatial length.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one receiver comprises multiple receivers.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one transmitter comprises multiple transmitters.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the barrier parameters are used to identify regions along the borehole for performing additional well services.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein the locating, the activating, and the recording occur during a borehole drilling operation.

10. The method of claim 1 , further comprising repeating the locating, the activating, the recording, and the processing to determine barrier changes over time.

11. A method for characterizing a physical barrier comprising a plurality of casings and at least one annular fill installed in a borehole traversing a formation, the method comprising:
locating an acoustic tool comprising at least one transmitter and at least one receiver at a location in the borehole, wherein the acoustic tool is configured to perform pulse-echo measurements and pitch-catch measurements of the physical barrier;
using the at least one transmitter of the acoustic tool, generating (i) pulse-echo waveforms that interact with the physical barrier and that have a frequency of at least 80 kHz, wherein the at least one transmitter is oriented normal to the physical barrier and (ii) pitch-catch waveforms that interact with the barrier and that have a frequency of at least 80 kHz, wherein the at least one transmitter is oriented at one or more angles to excite at least one mode within the physical barrier;
using the at least one receiver, recording resulting pulse-echo waveforms that result from the interaction of the pulse-echo waveforms with the physical barrier and resulting pitch-catch waveforms that result from the interaction of the pitch-catch waveforms with the physical barrier to obtain pulse-echo waveform data and pitch-catch waveform data; and
processing the pulse-echo waveform data and the pitch-catch waveform data using an inversion to obtain barrier parameters as a function of azimuth and depth along the borehole.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein the barrier parameters comprise at least one of (i) barrier wavespeeds, (ii) bond compliance at a casing-cement interface, (iii) bond compliance at a cement-formation interface, (iv) indications of barrier abnormalities, and (v) combinations thereof.

13. The method of claim 11 , wherein the processing further comprises:
processing the pulse-echo waveform data and pitch-catch waveform data using the inversion to obtain initial barrier parameters;
generating a reference waveform using a measurement simulator and the initial barrier parameters;
comparing at least one of the two types of waveforms and the generated waveform; and
updating the initial barrier parameters based on the comparison.

14. The method of claim 11 , wherein the inversion comprises full waveform inversion, attributes-based inversion, or both.

15. The method of claim 13 , wherein the measurement simulator uses casing parameters, mud parameters, wellbore geometry and tool parameters to generate the generated waveform.

16. A method for characterizing a physical barrier comprising multiple casings and multiple annular fills installed in a borehole traversing a formation, the method comprising:
locating a sonic tool at a location in the borehole, wherein the sonic tool comprises a transmitter and an array of receivers;
using the transmitter of the sonic tool, generating sonic waveforms that interact with the physical barrier;
using the array of receivers, recording resulting waveforms that result from the interaction of the sonic waveforms and the physical barrier to obtain sonic waveform data;
processing the sonic waveform data to obtain measured dispersions;
calculating reference dispersions using barrier parameters obtained from inverting ultrasonic data obtained from ultrasonic measurements of the barrier;
comparing the measured dispersions and reference dispersions;
updating the barrier parameters that were not obtained from inverting ultrasonic data obtained from ultrasonic measurements of the physical barrier;
repeating the calculating, comparing, and updating to minimize differences between the measured dispersions and the reference dispersions; and
characterizing mechanical integrity of the physical barrier using the barrier parameters.

17. The method of claim 16 , wherein the transmitter of the sonic tool comprises a monopole transmitter, dipole transmitter, quadrupole transmitter, or a combination thereof.

18. The method of claim 16 , wherein the transmitter of the sonic tool generates waveforms that are monopole, dipole, quadrupole, or a combination thereof.

19. The method of claim 16 , wherein the calculating the reference dispersions comprises calculating reference dispersions for a barrier that includes multiple casings and multiple annular fills using (i) casing parameters, (ii) mud parameters, (iii) hole geometry, (iv) cement parameters obtained from inverting ultrasonic data obtained from ultrasonic measurements of the barrier, and (v) bond parameters obtained from inverting ultrasonic data obt

Assignees

• Schlumberger Technology Corp

Inventors

• Zeroug Smaine
• Sinha Bikash K
• Bose Sandip
• Yang Jiaqi
• Lei Ting
• Kalyanaraman Ram Sunder

Classifications

• G01V1/50

  Analysing data · CPC title

• E21B49/00

  Testing the nature of borehole walls; Formation testing; Methods or apparatus for obtaining samples of soil or well fluids, specially adapted to earth drilling or wells · CPC title

• E21B47/14 Primary

  using acoustic waves · CPC title

• E21B47/005 Primary

  Monitoring or checking of cementation quality or level · CPC title

• E21B49/003 Primary

  by analysing drilling variables or conditions (E21B49/005 takes precedence; systems specially adapted for monitoring a plurality of drilling variables or conditions E21B44/00) · CPC title