P-wave reflectivity parameterization and nonlinear inversion in terms of Young’s modulus and Poisson ratio

Abstract

Young’s modulus and Poisson ratio are essential parameters for rock brittleness evaluation. At present, prestack inversions of these parameters mostly adopt linear approximation, whereas the nonlinear inversion methods that are based on the exact Zoeppritz equation are seldomly conducted. Nevertheless, in the case of large incident angles and high-impedance contrast, the nonlinear equation has higher accuracy than the linear approximation. It is more in line with the nature of geophysical inversion problems, and it describes the variation of formations’ elastic parameters better than the linear approximation does. Therefore, based on the exact solution of the Zoeppritz equation, we have parameterized and derived a new nonlinear reflection coefficient equation using nonlinear Young’s modulus, Poisson ratio, and density (YPD) as variables. Subsequently, by combining the inverse operator algorithm with the YPD equation, we develop a new nonlinear amplitude-variation-with-offset inversion scheme. This approach can robustly extract Young’s modulus and Poisson ratio from seismic data and identify shale-gas sweet spot locations within the reservoir, as well as predict reservoir fluid properties. We have tested the accuracy and applicability of this approach with synthetic and real data examples.