Estimating porosity and density of calcarenite rocks from P-wave velocity

Abstract

Petrophysical proprieties such as porosity, density, saturation have a marked impact on acoustic proprieties of rocks. Hence, there has been recently a strong incentive to use new geophysical techniques to invert such properties from seismic or sonic measurements for rocks characterization. The P-wave velocity, is non-destructive and easy method to apply in both field and laboratory conditions, has increasingly been conducted to determine the geotechnical properties of rock materials. The P-wave velocity of a rock is closely related to the intact rock properties and measuring the velocity in rock masses describes the rock structure and texture. The present work deals with the use of simple and non destructive technique, ultrasonic velocity to predict the porosity and density of calcarenite rocks that is characteristic in historical monument. The ultrasonic test is based on measuring the propagation time of a P-wave in the longitudinal direction. Good correlations between P-wave velocity, porosity and density were found, which indicate them as appropriate technique for estimating the porosity and density.