Locating Desired Source Rocks by Using Shallow Ground Penetrating Radar and Seismic Survey Methods in western Washington, Pacific Northwest of the U.S

Abstract:

The Washington State Department of Natural Resources (WADNR) manages 2.1 million acres of forested state trust lands in Washington. WADNR sells timber and other agricultural products to help fund local services and the construction of institutions such as public schools and universities. Quality of rocks used as a surface on the roads built to access the timber is the essential and selecting appropriate rock quarry locations is challenging. Traditional borehole drilling methods only provide information from discrete locations. The study was conducted in the Capitol Forest area of western Washington. In our previous study, we suggested that a combination of P-wave seismic and ground penetrating radar (GPR) can be a rapid, comprehensive and cost effective alternative for identifying desired rock sources. In this study, we further improved upon that method and accomplished the following: 1) rock quality at a relatively fine resolution was distinguished and 2) the spatial variability of the rock was identified. Both 450 MHz and 80 MHz GPR antennas were used to obtain high resolution radargrams in the near-surface zone with 5m maximum penetration depth and lower resolution radargrams in the deeper subsurface zone with about 20m maximum penetration depth. We then correlated the GPR radargrams with P-wave velocities using the refraction survey data as well as S-wave velocities, estimated using Multi-Channel Analysis of Surface Waves (MASW) survey data. Additionally, nearby test pits and boreholes (maximum depth = 15 meters) were used to confirm the geophysical measurements. Our study results demonstrate that the combination of GPR, using the two antennas, and seismic surveys provides very useful subsurface information regarding quality and spatial distribution of the rocks beneath the overburden. Subsurface images gathered from these combined geophysical methods do assist quarry operators to rapidly locate the desired rock sources.