Relating Reactive Transport to Hierarchical Sedimentary Architecture. Part 1. Horizontal Spatial Correlation of Hydraulic and Reactive Transport Parameters

Abstract:

A number of studies of the spatial correlation of log permeability (Y) in different sedimentary aquifers are reviewed showing that the spatial correlation structure can be defined by how the proportion of lag transitions crossing different facies (i.e. the cross-transition probability structure) increases with increasing lag distance. The common underlying cross-transition structure can contain substructures with different correlation ranges corresponding to different scales of sedimentary facies within the hierarchy of the sedimentary architecture. For each substructure, the standard deviation in facies length relative to the mean can mostly define the shape, and the proportions and mean length of facies define the range. An illustrative example from the Borden research site shows the horizontal spatial bivariate correlation of Y and of reactive attributes (R) affecting subsurface transport are both defined by the same underlying cross-transition probability structures. Thus, the horizontal Y and R autosemivariograms and the R-Y cross-semivariogram have the same underlying composite correlation structure and substructures (shape and range in the rise to a sill). Such cross-transition probability based correlation structures are used in the companion Part 2 presentation (Soltanian et al.) to develop models which relate the time-dependent effective retardation and the particle displacement variance to hierarchical sedimentary architecture.