Crustal thermal models for South Siberia

Summary The results of geothermal research carried out in South Siberia (West-Siberian and Siberian Platforms, Altai-Sayan folded area and the Baikalian arched uplift zone) were employed to calculate the Earth's crustal temperatures. It is shown that temperature is a function of the heat flow value. The maps of the surface heat flow and the temperatures at the Moho discontinuity are presented and characteristic temperature-depth profiles were compiled for specific tectonic areas. The West-Siberian and Siberian Platforms, as well as the Altai-Sayan folded region are characterized by rather low heat flow, 42–50mW m ^–2 (1.0–1.2 µcal/cm ² s), and low temperatures at the Moho boundary.400–500 °C. The thermal conditions in the area of Lake Baikal are extreme, the heat flow reaches here100–142 mW m ^–2 (2.4–3.4 µcal/cm ² s), and the temperature at the crust's bottom may exceed1000 °C. The Moho-surface according to our calculations is nonisothermal.     

Using Four-Component Geophones: Effect on the Quality and Reliability of Multicomponent Seismic Recording and Analysis of Processing Methods

For seismic observations in mines or wells, instead of three-component geophones, four-component ones with sensors located along the tetrahedral axes are sometimes used. When a geophone is placed in a hard-to-reach area for a long time, the requirements on its reliability increase, so it is necessary to monitor its operation. From this viewpoint, a four-component geophone has certain advantages over the conventional three-component geophone, the three ones being suppression of instrument noise for the recalculation of a four-component record into a three-component one, saving of the polarization analysis data in case one geophone component fails, and sensitivity control of individual geophone components. To suppress instrument noise in records from a four-component geophone, the following processing should be performed: first, calculation of the covariance matrix of recording components, second calculation of the eigenvalues and eigenvectors of the covariance matrix, and third, the parameter used to assess the ratio of instrument noise to the useful signal is calculated. After that, the operator projecting a four-component displacement vector onto a three-dimensional subspace is constructed. Application of this operator to data suppresses interference or noise (which do not correspond to motion in three-dimensional space). The output of the processing is data partially cleaned of instrument noise. In this paper, using model examples, we analyze the features of processing data from four-component geophones. The possibility of suppressing instrument noise and controlling the sensitivities of individual geophone components is demonstrated, and the effect on polarization analysis results is shown.     

Approximate traveltime inversion in downhole microseismic monitoring

In downhole microseismic monitoring, accurate event location relies on the accuracy of the velocity model. The model can be estimated along with event locations. Anisotropic models are important to get accurate event locations. Taking anisotropy into account makes it possible to use additional data – two S-wave arrivals generated due to shear-wave splitting. However, anisotropic ray tracing requires iterative procedures for computing group velocities, which may become unstable around caustics. As a result, anisotropic kinematic inversion may become time consuming. In this paper, we explore the idea of using simplified ray tracing to locate events and estimate medium parameters. In the simplified ray-tracing algorithm, the group velocity is assumed to be equal to phase velocity in both magnitude and direction. This assumption makes the ray-tracing algorithm five times faster compared to ray tracing based on exact equations. We present a set of tests showing that given perforation-shot data, one can use inversion based on simplified ray-tracing even for moderate-to-strong anisotropic models. When there are no perforation shots, event-location errors may become too large for moderately anisotropic media.     

Prestack shot-gather depth migration by a rigid flow of Gaussian wave packets

We introduce a new method for prestack depth migration of seismic common-shot gathers. The computational procedure follows standard steps of the reverse-time migration, i.e., downward continuation of the source and the receiver wavefields, followed by application of an imaging condition (e.g. zero-lag cross-correlation of these fields). In our method we first find a sparse data representation with a small number of Gaussian wave packets. We then approximate the downward wavefield propagation (for the source and the receiver fields) by a rigid flow of these wave packets along seismic rays. In this case, the wave packets are simply translated and rotated according to the ray geometry. One advantage of using Gaussian wave packets is that analytic formulas can be used for translation, rotation, and the application of the cross-correlation imaging condition. Moreover, they allow more sparse representations than competing methods. Finally we formulate a computationally and memory efficient migration procedure, as only few rays have to be traced, and since it is cheap to compute the cross-correlation for the intersecting rays.     

Thermal anomalies associated with shallow gas hydrates in the K-2 mud volcano, Lake Baikal

Thermal measurements and hydrate mapping in the vicinity of the K-2 mud volcano in Lake Baikal have revealed a particular type of association of thermal anomalies (29–121?mW?m^–2) near hydrate-forming layers. Detailed coring within K-2 showed that hydrates are restricted to two distinct zones at sub-bottom depths exceeding 70–300?cm. Temperature data from stations with hydrate recovery and degassing features all display low thermal gradients. Otherwise, the thermal gradients within the mud volcano are generally increased. These findings imply a more complicated thermal regime than often assumed for mud volcanoes, with important roles for both fluids and hydrates. The coexistence of neighbouring low and high thermal anomalies is interpreted to result from discharging and recharging fluid activity, rather than hydrate thermodynamics. It is suggested that hydrates play a key role in controlling the fluid circulation pattern at an early stage. At a later stage, the inflow of undersaturated lake water would favour the dissolution of structure I hydrates and the formation of structure II hydrates, the latter having been observed on top of structure I hydrates in the K-2 mud volcano.     

Laboratory modeling and measurement of the acoustic properties of methane-bearing rock samples

The laboratory equipment for simulation of methane-bearing rock samples and study of their acoustic properties (velocities of P- and S-waves) is described briefly. The experimental results are considered.