• Geophysics and Geophysical Exploration
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.60-66
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• 2006

Three differing sandstones, two synthetic and one field sample, have been tested ultrasonically under a range of confining pressures and pore pressures representative of in-situ reservoir pressures. These sandstones include: a synthetic sandstone with calcite intergranular cement produced using the CSIRO Calcite In-situ Precipitation Process (CIPS); a synthetic sandstone with silica intergranular cement; and a core sample from the Otway Basin Waarre Formation, Boggy Creek 1 well, from the target lithology for a trial $CO_2$ pilot project. Initial testing was carried on the cores at "room-dried" conditions, with confining pressures up to 65 MPa in steps of 5 MPa. All cores were then flooded with $CO_2$, initially in the gas phase at 6 MPa, $22^{\circ}C$, then with liquid-phase $CO_2$ at a temperature of $22^{\circ}C$ and pressures from 7 MPa to 17 MPa in steps of 5 MPa. Confining pressures varied from 10 MPa to 65 MPa. Ultrasonic waveforms for both P- and S-waves were recorded at each effective pressure increment. Velocity versus effective pressure responses were calculated from the experimental data for both P- and S-waves. Attenuations $(1/Q_p)$ were calculated from the waveform data using spectral ratio methods. Theoretical calculations of velocity as a function of effective pressure for each sandstone were made using the $CO_2$ pressure-density and $CO_2$ bulk modulus-pressure phase diagrams and Gassmann effective medium theory. Flooding the cores with gaseous phase $CO_2$ produced negligible change in velocity-effective stress relationships compared to the dry state (air saturated). Flooding with liquid-phase $CO_2$ at various pore pressures lowered velocities by approximately 8% on average compared to the air-saturated state. Attenuations increased with liquid-phase $CO_2$ flooding compared to the air-saturated case. Experimental data agreed with the Gassmann calculations at high effective pressures. The "critical" effective pressure, at which agreement with theory occurred, varied with sandstone type. Discrepancies are thought to be due to differing micro-crack populations in the microstructure of each sandstone type. The agreement with theory at high effective pressures is significant and gives some confidence in predicting seismic behaviour under field conditions when $CO_2$ is injected.

• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2010.03a
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• pp.523-534
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• 2010

A hybrid system of soil-nailing and compression anchor is proposed in this paper; the system is composed of an anchor bar (installed at the tip) with two PC strands and a steel bar. After drilling a hole, installing proposed hybrid systems, and filling the hole with grouting material, prestress is applied to the anchor bar to restrict the deformation at the head and/or to prevent shallow slope failures. However, since the elongation rate of PC strand is much larger than that of steel bar, yield at the steel bar will occur much earlier than the PC strand. It means that the yield load of the hybrid system will be overestimated if we simply add yield loads of the two - anchor bar and PC strands. It might be needed to try to match the yielding time of the two materials by applying the prestress to the anchor bar. It means that the main purpose of applying prestress to the anchor bar should be two-fold: to restrict the deformation at the nail head; and more importantly, to maximize the design load of the hybrid system by utilizing load transfer mechanism that transfers the prestress applied at the tip to the head through anchor bar. In order to study the load transfer mechanism in a systematic way, in-situ pullout tests were performed with the following conditions: soil-nailing only; hybrid system with the variation of prestress stresses from 0kN to 196kN. It was found that the prestress applied to the anchor system will induce the compressive stress to the steel bar; it will result in decrease in the slope of load-displacement curve of the steel bar. Then, the elongation at which the steel bar will reach yield stress might become similar to that of PC strands. By taking advantage of prestress to match elongations at yield, the pullout design load of the hybrid system can be increased up to twice that of the soil-nailing system.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.23 no.7
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• pp.87-98
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• 2007

A series of dilatometer test, field vane test, and $CK_0U$ triaxial test were performed for clayey soils of Busan new port site to develop the relationships between undrained shear strength and the DMT results. Normalized undrained shear strength is turned out to be $S_{u(CKU)}/{\sigma}'_v=0.30{\sim}0.35\;for\;CK_0U$ triaxial test and ${\mu}S_{u(VST)}/{\sigma}'_v=0.20{\sim}0.22$ for vane shear test. By comparing the undrained shear strength estimated from DMT indices with the results measured by in-situ vane test or $CK_0U$ triaxial test, two methods to predict the undrained shear strength from DMT results are suggested. One is based on the relationship between $S_u/{\sigma}'_v$ and horizontal stress index (KD) while another method comes from $N_c-I_D$ and $N_c-E_D$ correlation. It was observed that the method based on $N_c-I_D\;or\;N_c-E_D$ relation shows slightly better accuracy than the one based on $K_D$ although all of the methods suggested in this study provided comparable values of predicted undrained shear strength. Since the definitions of $I_D\;and\;E_D$ contain $p_1-p_0$, in which soil condition is reflected, it is believed that the prediction method using $N_c$ is capable of taking a material type into consideration.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.44 no.1
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• pp.83-94
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• 2011

Extra heavy oil reservoirs are distributed over the world but most of them is deposited in the northern part of the Orinoco River in Venezuela, in the area of 5,500 $km^2$, This region, which has been commonly called "the Orinoco Oil Belt", contains estimated 1.3 trillion barrels of original oil-in-place and 250 billion barrels of established reserves. The Venezuela extra heavy oil has an API gravity of less than 10 degree and in situ viscosity of 5,000 cP at reservoir condition. Although the presence of extra heavy oil in the Orinoco Oil Belt has been initially reported in the 1930's, the commercial development using in situ cold production started in the 1990's. The Orinoco heavy oil deposits are clustered into 4 development areas, Boyaco, Junin, Ayachoco, and Carabobo respectively, and they are subdivided into totally 31 production blocks. Nowadays, PDVSA (Petr$\'{o}$leos de Venzuela, S.A.) makes a development of each production block with the international oil companies from more than 20 countries forming a international joint-venture company. The Eastern Venezuela Basin, the Orinoco Oil Belt is included in, is one of the major oil-bearing sedimentary basins in Venezuela and is first formed as a passive margin basin by the Jurassic tectonic plate motion. The major source rock of heavy oil is the late Cretaceous calcareous shale in the central Eastern Venezuela Basin. Hydrocarbon materials migrated an average of 150 km up dip to the southern margin of the basin. During the migration, lighter fractions in the hydrocarbon were removed by biodegradation and the oil changed into heavy and/or extra heavy oil. Miocene Oficina Formation, the main extra heavy oil reservoir, is the unconsolidated sand and shale alternation formed in fluvial-estuarine environment and also has irregularly a large number of the Cenozoic faults induced by basin subsidence and tectonics. Because Oficina Formation has not only complex lithology distribution but also irregular geology structure, geological evolution and characteristics of the reservoirs have to be determined for economical production well design and effective oil recovery. This study introduces geological formation and evolution of the Venezuela extra heavy oil reservoirs and suggest their significant geological characteristics which are (1) thickness and geometry of reservoir pay sands, (2) continuity and thickness of mud beds, (3) geometry of faults, (4) depth and geothermal character of reservoir, (5) in-situ stress field of reservoir, and (6) chemical composition of extra heavy oil. Newly developed exploration techniques, such as 3-D seismic survey and LWD (logging while drilling), can be expected as powerful methods to recognize the geological reservoir characteristics in the Orinoco Oil Belt.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.30 no.6
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• pp.613-624
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• 1997

A study of anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility (AMS) was conducted on the Ordovician-Eocene strata in the Taebaek area. The study area is a northeastern part of the Okchon belt, sometimes called as Paegunsan Synclinal Area. A total of 600 independently oriented samples were collected from 60 sites covering the whole area. With a few exception of late Cretaceous-Eocene volcanic rocks, all the sampled strata are nonmetamorphosed sedimentary rocks, mainly sandstones. Among the 60 sites, 5 sites showed flow lineation lying on the bedding plane, 11 sites showed load foliation parallel to the bedding plane, and 21 sites showed tectonic foliation unrelated to the bedding plane. The tectonic foliations are defined by $k_1-k_2$ ($k_{max}-k_{int}$) anisotropy plane, and are considered as a result of tectonic forces acted perpendicularly to the foliation plane in the geologic past. Regardless of sample-site locations, tectonic force directions defined by $k_3$ ($k_{min}$) axis perpendicular to the tectonic foliation are consistent among the strata of the same geologic age. In the course of geologic time, however, the tectonic force directions showed a clockwise rotation: approximately E-W in the Ordovician sites, NW-SE in the Permian sites, N-S in the Triassic sites, and lastly NE-SW in the late Cretaceous-Eocene sites. The pre-Permian directions showed better clustering in the in-situ (geographic) coordinates, while the younger directions become better clustered after the bedding-tilt correction. It is interpreted that the major tectonic structures of the Taebaek area were controlled by the above-mentioned tectonic forces: The Paegunsan Syncline and the Hambaeksan Fault must have been generated by the NW-SE force of late Permian-early Triassic time. It was then reactivated in the reverse (dextral) sense by the N-S force of Triassic time. The Osipchon Fault in the eastern part of the study area was either generated or reactivated by the NE-SW force of late Cretaceous-Eocene time. The Permo-Triassic NW-SE force should be an expression of the Songnim Disturbance in the Korean peninsula, which is in turn related with the SCB/NCB collision in China.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.109-119
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• 2001

Up to now single large cavern was excavated for each undergroud hydraulic powerhouse in Korea. But the Yangyang underground hydraulic powerhouse consists of two large caverns; a powerhouse cavern and main transformer cavern. In this carte, the structural stability of the caverns, especially the rock pillar formed between two large caverns, should be guaranteed to be sound to make the caverns permanently sustainable. In this research, the Distinct Element Method(DEM) was used to analyze the structural stability of two caverns and the rock pillar. The Barton-Bandis joint model was used as a constitutive model. The moot significant parameters such as in-site stress, JRC of in-situ natural joints, and spatial distribution characteristics of discontinuities were acquired through field investigation. In addition, two different cases; 1) with no support system and 2) with a support system, were analysed to optimize a support system and to investigate reinforcing effects of a support system. The results of analysis horizontal displacement and joint shear displacement proved to be reduced with the support system. The relaxed zone in the rock pilar also proved to be reduced in conjunction with the support system. Having a support system in place provided the fact that the non zero minimum principal stresses were still acting in the rock pillar so that the pillar was not under uniaxial compressive condition but under triaxial compressive condition. The structural stability f an approximately 36 m wide rock pillar between two large caverns was assured with the appropriate support system.

• The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.51-61
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• 2010

Surface particulate organic carbon (POC) concentration was measured in the Northeastern Gulf of Mexico on 9 cruises from November 1997 to August 2000 to investigate the seasonal and spatial variability related to synchronous remote sensing data (Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor (SeaWiFS), sea surface temperature (SST), sea surface height anomaly (SSHA), and sea surface wind (SSW)) and recorded river discharge data. Surface POC concentrations have higher values (>100 $mg/m^3$) on the inner shelf and near the Mississippi Delta, and decrease across the shelf and slope. The inter-annual variations of surface POC concentrations are relatively higher during 1997 and 1998 (El Nino) than during 1999 and 2000 (La Nina) in the study area. This phenomenon is directly related to the output of Mississippi River and other major rivers, which associated with global climate change such as ENSO events. Although highest river runoff into the northern Gulf of Mexico Coast occurs in early spring and lowest flow in late summer and fall, wide-range POC plumes are observed during the summer cruises and lower concentrations and narrow dispersion of POC during the spring and fall cruises. During the summer seasons, the river discharge remarkably decreases compared to the spring, but increasing temperature causes strong stratification of the water column and increasing buoyancy in near-surface waters. Low-density plumes containing higher POC concentrations extend out over the shelf and slope with spatial patterns and controlled by the Loop Current and eddies, which dominate offshore circulation. Although river discharge is normal or abnormal during the spring and fall seasons, increasing wind stress and decreasing temperature cause vertical mixing, with higher surface POC concentrations confined to the inner shelf.