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Active‐distributed temperature sensing to continuously quantify vertical flow in boreholes
Author(s) -
Read T.,
Bour O.,
Selker J. S.,
Bense V. F.,
Borgne T. Le,
Hochreutener R.,
Lavenant N.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
water resources research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.863
H-Index - 217
eISSN - 1944-7973
pISSN - 0043-1397
DOI - 10.1002/2014wr015273
Subject(s) - borehole , flow (mathematics) , aquifer , geology , flow measurement , flow velocity , fluid dynamics , volumetric flow rate , geotechnical engineering , mechanics , petroleum engineering , physics , groundwater
We show how a distributed borehole flowmeter can be created from armored Fiber Optic cables with the Active‐Distributed Temperature Sensing (A‐DTS) method. The principle is that in a flowing fluid, the difference in temperature between a heated and unheated cable is a function of the fluid velocity. We outline the physical basis of the methodology and report on the deployment of a prototype A‐DTS flowmeter in a fractured rock aquifer. With this design, an increase in flow velocity from 0.01 to 0.3 m s −1 elicited a 2.5°C cooling effect. It is envisaged that with further development this method will have applications where point measurements of borehole vertical flow do not fully capture combined spatiotemporal dynamics.