A theoretical study of surface‐to‐borehole electromagnetic logging in cased holes

Abstract

A new electromagnetic logging method, in which the source is a horizontal loop coaxial with a cased drill hole and the secondary axial fields are measured at depth within the casing, has been analyzed. The analysis, which is for an idealized model of an infinite pipe in a conductive whole space, has shown that the casing and formation are uncoupled at the low frequencies that would be used in field studies. The field inside the casing may be found by first finding the field in the formation and then using this field as an incident field for the pipe alone. This result permits the formation response to be recovered from the measured field in the borehole by applying a correction for the known properties of the casing. If the casing response cannot be accurately predicted, a separate logging tool employing a higher frequency transmitter could be used to determine the required casing parameters in the vicinity of the receiver. This logging technique shows excellent sensitivity to changes in formation conductivity, but it is not yet known how well horizontal stratification can be resolved. One of its most promising applications will be in monitoring, through repeated measurements, changes in formation conductivity during production or enhanced recovery operations.