Combined Scaling of Fluid Flow and Seismic Stiffness in Single Fractures

The connection between fluid flow and seismic stiffness in single fractures is governed by the geometry of the fracture through the size and spatial distributions of the void and contact areas. Flow and stiffness each exhibit scaling behavior as the scale of observation shifts from local to global sample sizes. The purpose of this study was to explore the joint scaling of both properties using numerical models. Finite-size scaling methods are used to extract critical thresholds and power laws for fluid flow through weakly correlated fractures under increasing load. An important element in the numerical fracture deformation is the use of extended boundary conditions that simulate differences between laboratory cores relative to in situ field studies. The simulated field conditions enable joint scaling of flow and stiffness to emerge with the potential to extrapolate from small laboratory samples to behavior on the field scale.