ADVANCED DENSITY LOGGING TOOL

A RESEARCH PROGRAM IS PROPOSED TO DEVELOP A NEW AND INNOVATIVE TYPE OF BOREHOLE LOGGING TOOL FOR MEASURING THE BULK DENSITY OF GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS. THIS TOOL USES ALINEAR INDUCTION ACCELERATOR (LIA) TO GENERATE AN INTENSE X-RAY BEAM WHICH IS SCATTERED FROM THE FORMATION. DETECTORS PLACED NEAR THE ACCELERATOR SENSE THE SCATTERED PHOTONS THEREBY PROVIDING A DIRECT MEASURE OF DENSITY. LIA-BASED SYSTEMS OFFER SUBSTANTIAL ADVANTAGES OVER OTHER DENSITY LOGGING TOOLS. BECAUSE ITS INTENSITY IS >50X MORE THAN THAT FOR RADIOACTIVE TOOLS, THE LIA FACILITATES HIGHER SENSITIVITY AND/OR LOGGING SPEED WHILE OFFERING GREATER SAFETY DURING HANDLING AND TRANSPORT. ALSO, IT WILL BE MORERUGGED, CAPABLE OF HIGHER OPERATING TEMPERATURES (>175 DEGREES CENTIGRADE), AND >3X LESS EXPENSIVE THAN OTHERX-RAY-TYPE LOGGING CONCEPTS. THE PHASE I PROGRAM WILL ASSESS THE FEASIBILITY OF A LIA-BASED LOGGING TOOL WITH THE FOLLOWING PARAMETERS: (1) ELECTRON ENERGY 1 MEV; (2) BEAM CURRENT 50 MUA; (3) DIAMETER 10 CM AND (4) COST $50,000. WE PROPOSE TO PERFORM THREE TASKS: (1) DEVELOP A LIA SYSTEM DESIGN INCLUDING THE ACCELERATOR, ITS POWER SYSTEM AND AN X-RAY CONVERTER; (2) PERFORM EXPERIMENTS TO EVALUATE AND SELECT KEY LIA COMPONENTS AND (3) DEVELOP A CONCEPTUAL DESIGN FOR THE X-RAY DETECTOR SYSTEM. SUCCESS IN PHASE I WILL PROVIDE A FIRM FOUNDATION FOR DEVELOPMENT OFA LABORATORY PROTOTYPE LOGGING TOOL IN PHASE II.