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US 9,540,928 B2Granted
Rock property measurements while drilling
AssigneeThe University of Sydney
InventorsHang Zhou, Peter James Hatherly
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Described herein is a method and system for characterizing in-ground rock types from measurement-while-drilling data in a mining environment. The method includes the steps of drilling holes at a plurality of selected locations within a region of interest; collecting measurements while drilling to obtain an array of data samples (162) indicative of rock hardness at various drilling depths in the drill hole locations; obtaining a characteristic measure (163) of the array of data samples; performing Gaussian Process regression (164) on the characteristic measure; and applying boundary detection (166) to the rock hardness output data obtained from the Gaussian process model to identify the distribution (280) of at least one cluster of rock type within the region of interest.
Claims29
A method for generating a continuous rock type distribution map characterizing in-ground rock types from measurement-while-drilling data in a mining environment, comprising:
- drilling holes at a plurality of selected locations within a region of interest;
- collecting measurements-while-drilling, the measurements comprising penetration rate, and at least one of pull down pressure and rotation pressure;
- determining, with a processor, from the collected measurements a discontinuous rock type distribution map comprising an array of characteristic measures indicative of rock hardness at various drilling depths in the drill hole locations;
- generating a continuous rock type distribution map from the discontinuous rock type distribution map by:
- applying the discontinuous rock type distribution map to a Gaussian process with a selected covariance function to generate a Gaussian process model with optimized hyperparameters;
- sampling the Gaussian process model by performing Gaussian process regression at a selected spatial resolution within the region of interest;
- and
- applying boundary detection to rock hardness output data obtained from the sampling of the Gaussian process model to identify the distribution of at least one cluster of rock type within the region of interest, the boundary detection based on received hardness data between at least a first rock type and a second rock type;
- and
- including the detected boundaries in the continuous rock type distribution map.
7 more elements
A system for generating a continuous rock type distribution map of in-ground rock types from measurement-while-drilling data in a mining environment, comprising:
- a drill equipped with at least one sensor for generating measurement-while drilling-data, the measurements comprising penetration rate, and at least one of pull down pressure and rotation pressure;
- a processor for determining, from the measurements, a discontinuous rock type distribution map comprising an array of characteristic measures indicative of the hardness of the rock being drilled, and a spatial position sensor for generating spatial position information corresponding to the array of characteristic measures within a region of interest;
- a data storage for storing the discontinuous rock type distribution map, the array of characteristic measures and corresponding spatial position information;
- a training processor adapted to apply the discontinuous rock type distribution map to a Gaussian process with a selected covariance function to generate and store a Gaussian process model with optimized hyperparameters;
- an evaluation processor for sampling the Gaussian process model by performing Gaussian process regression at a selected spatial resolution within the region of interest;
- and
- a boundary processor for discerning and including detected boundaries in the continuous rock type distribution map of at least one rock type in the region of interest by applying boundary detection to rock hardness output data obtained from the sampling of the Gaussian process model to identify the distribution of at least one cluster of rock type within the region of interest, the boundary detection based on received hardness data between at least a first rock type and a second rock type.
4 more elements
A method for generating a continuous rock type distribution map of in-ground rock types in a mining environment, comprising:
- recording measurements from a plurality of drill sensors whilst drilling a plurality of holes through rock within a region of interest, the measurements comprising penetration rate, and at least one of pull down pressure and rotation pressure;
- using the recorded sensor measurements to generate, with a processor, a discontinuous rock type distribution map comprising an array of characteristic measures indicative of rock hardness at various drilling depths in the plurality of drill hole locations;
- applying the discontinuous rock type distribution map to a Gaussian process with a selected covariance function to generate a Gaussian process model with optimized hyperparameters;
- sampling the Gaussian process model by performing Gaussian process regression at a selected spatial resolution within the region of interest;
- and
- discerning the continuous rock type distribution map of in-ground rock types within the region of interest by applying boundary detection to the rock hardness sample data output from the Gaussian process model to identify the distribution of at least one cluster of rock type within the region of interest, the boundary detection based on received hardness data between at least a first rock type and a second rock type;
- and
- including the detected boundaries in the continuous rock type distribution map.
5 more elements
A method for generating a continuous rock type distribution map characterizing in-ground rock types from measurement-while-drilling (MWD) data in a region of interest, comprising:
- measuring a set of data obtained while drilling a plurality of drill holes, the set of data comprising penetration rate, and at least one of pull down pressure and rotation pressure and associated with three-dimensional spatial information defined by the location of the drill holes and a corresponding depth of drilling;
- determining from the set of data a discontinuous rock type distribution map comprising an array of characteristic measures indicative of rock hardness;
- generating a continuous rock type distribution map from the discontinuous rock type distribution map by:
- training a Gaussian Process model using the discontinuous rock type distribution map as an input, to provide a model of rock hardness in the region of interest;
- sampling the model of rock hardness at a specified spatial resolution that is denser than a spatial resolution defined by the drill holes, to provide an inferred three-dimensional rock hardness distribution;
- and
- applying a classifier to the inferred rock hardness distribution to identify a distribution of at least one rock type within the region of interest, wherein a boundary of the at least one rock type is determined from the inferred three-dimensional rock hardness distribution, the boundary determination based on received hardness data between at least a first rock type and a second rock type;
- and
- including, in the continuous rock type distribution map, the identified distribution.
6 more elements
A computer program product comprising machine-readable program code recorded on a machine-readable recording medium, for controlling the operation of a data processing apparatus on which the program code executes to perform a method for generating a continuous rock type distribution map characterizing in-ground rock types from measurement-while-drilling (MWD) data in a region of interest, comprising:
- measuring a set of data obtained while drilling a plurality of drill holes, the set of data comprising penetration rate, and at least one of pull down pressure and rotation pressure and associated with three-dimensional spatial information defined by the location of the drill holes and a corresponding depth of drilling;
- generating a discontinuous rock type distribution map from the set of data obtained while drilling;
- generating a continuous rock type distribution map from the discontinuous rock type distribution map by:
- training a Gaussian Process model using the discontinuous rock type distribution map as an input, to provide a model of rock hardness in the region of interest;
- sampling the model of rock hardness at a specified spatial resolution that is denser than a spatial resolution defined by the drill holes, to provide an inferred three-dimensional rock hardness distribution;
- and
- applying a classifier to the inferred rock hardness distribution to identify a distribution of at least one rock type within the region of interest, wherein a boundary of the at least one rock type is determined from the inferred three-dimensional rock hardness distribution, the boundary determination based on received hardness data between at least a first rock type and a second rock type;
- and
- including, in the continuous rock type distribution map, the identified distribution.
6 more elements
A method for generating a continuous rock type distribution map characterizing in-ground rock types from measurement-while-drilling data in a mining environment, comprising:
- drilling holes at a plurality of selected locations within a region of interest;
- collecting measurements-while-drilling to obtain an array of data samples, the measurements comprising penetration rate, and at least one of pull down pressure and rotation pressure;
- obtaining, with a processor, from the collected measurements a discontinuous rock type distribution map comprising a characteristic measure of the array of data samples indicative of rock hardness at various drilling depths in the drill hole locations;
- generating a continuous rock type distribution map from the discontinuous rock type distribution map by:
- performing Gaussian Process regression on the discontinuous rock type distribution map;
- and
- applying boundary detection to the rock hardness output data obtained from the Gaussian process regression to identify the distribution of at least one cluster of rock type within the region of interest, the boundary detection based on received hardness data between at least a first rock type and a second rock type;
- and
- including the detected boundaries in the continuous rock type distribution map.
6 more elements
A method for generating a continuous rock type distribution map characterizing in-ground rock types from measurement-while-drilling data in a mining environment, comprising:
- drilling holes at a plurality of selected locations within a region of interest;
- collecting measurements-while-drilling, the measurements comprising penetration rate, and at least one of pull down pressure and rotation pressure;
- determining, with a processor, from the collected measurements a discontinuous rock type distribution map comprising an array of characteristic measures indicative of rock hardness at various drilling depths in the drill hole locations;
- generating a continuous rock type distribution map from the discontinuous rock type distribution map by:
- applying the discontinuous rock type distribution map to a Gaussian process with a selected covariance function to generate a Gaussian process model with optimized hyperparameters;
- and
- sampling the Gaussian process model by performing Gaussian process regression at a selected spatial resolution within the region of interest to provide a representation of rock hardness distribution
- applying boundary detection to the representation of rock hardness distribution.
5 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.