Wavelet Analysis of Characteristic Length Scales of Permeability in Stationary and Non-Stationary Porous Media

Heterogeneity of aquifer permeability has a significant influence on the transport of solutes; therefore accurate characterization of aquifer heterogeneity is needed to reliably predict the behavior of solutes. A critical characteristic of heterogeneity is the characteristic length scale that is a measure of the distance over which property values are correlated. We use two-dimensional continuous wavelet analysis to identify characteristic length scales of permeability in stationary and non-stationary porous media. We show that the global and local wavelet energy spectra are the appropriate measures to characterize length scales in stationary and non-stationary permeability fields, respectively. We demonstrate its effectiveness in identifying the characteristic length scales of two-dimensional synthetic permeability data.