Macroscopic mechanical properties of porous rock with one saturating fluid

Abstract

Effective frequency-dependent moduli and [Formula: see text]-factors are broadly used for characterizing the behavior of earth media in laboratory and field seismic observations. However, such properties are wavemode- and experiment-dependent and are often incomplete and/or inaccurate for modeling realistic situations. For example, viscoelastic moduli for porous fluid-saturated rock are usually derived for primary waves, but they may not apply to cases in which secondary waves are important, such as reflections in finely layered poroelastic media or quasistatic pore-fluid flows in laboratory experiments. To obtain a model applicable to all cases, equations of mechanics should be used, and mechanical properties of the material must be identified. To reveal and measure such properties for fluid-saturated porous rock, we have developed a Biot-consistent model based on Lagrangian continuum mechanics. The model is “minimal,” purely macroscopic, and independent of the macrostructure or patterns of pore-fluid flows; thus, it could represent many existing wave-induced fluid-flow (WIFF) as well as non-WIFF models. Due to its mechanical definition, the model should be applicable to all rock-physics experiments (linear creep, pore flow, low-frequency, resonant, or ultrasonic), any waves in the field (primary, secondary, standing, surface, etc.) under arbitrary boundary conditions, and also finite-difference and finite-element numerical modeling. When based on this model, numerical simulations require no integral equations, fractional derivatives, memory variables, or additional kinetic equations. We further use the model to invert for detailed elastic and viscous properties of fluid-saturated Berea and Fontainebleau sandstones from recently published low-frequency laboratory experiments. All rock properties inferred in the model are time- and frequency-independent, comparable to other physical observations, and the model closely predicts the data. The model can be approximately pore-fluid independent, which allows performing rigorous fluid substitution with viscous pore fluids. As an illustration, P-wave velocity dispersion and attenuation in water-, oil-, and gas-saturated sandstone are simulated.