Conditional simulation with data subject to measurement error: Post-simulation filtering with modified factorial kriging

Conditional simulation with data subject to measurement error has received little attention in the geostatistical literature. The treatment of measurement error in simulation must be different from its treatment in estimation. Two approaches are examined: pre- and post-simulation filtering of data measurement error. The pre-simulation filtering is shown to be inefficient. The post-simulation filtering performs best. It is done by factorial kriging and a modified version of factorial kriging which ensures predetermined theoretical variance for the filtered data. It also is shown that the theoretical variogram of the filtered data reproduces the underlying variogram (i.e., without noise) almost perfectly. A simulation with a high level of correlated noise is used for validation and comparison. The post-simulation filtered values show an experimental variogram in agreement with the previously identified underlying variogram. Moreover, the filtered image compares well with the true image. The theoretical variogram corresponding to the post-simulation filter can be computed beforehand. Thus, the size of the simulation grid and of the filter neighborhood can be adjusted to ensure good reproduction of the underlying variogram.