Crosshole Ground-Penetrating Radar in Clay-Rich Quaternary deposits:
Towards Characterization of High-Loss Media
Abstract
Knowing the centimeter- to meter-scale distribution of sand in clayey
deposits is important for determining the dominating water flow
pathways. Borehole information has a high vertical resolution, on the
millimeter- to centimeter-scale, but provides poor lateral coverage. For
highly heterogeneous deposits, such as glacial diamicts, this detailed
borehole information may not be sufficient for creating reliable
geological models. Crosshole ground-penetrating radar (GPR) can provide
information on the decimeter- to meter-scale variation between
boreholes, as the GPR response depends on the dielectric permittivity,
electric conductivity, and the magnetic permeability of the subsurface.
In this study, we investigate whether crosshole GPR can provide
information on the material properties of diamicts, such as water
content, bulk density, and clay content, as well as their structural
relationships. To achieve ground truth, we compare the crosshole GPR
data with geological information from both boreholes and excavation at
the field site. The GPR data were analyzed comprehensively using several
radar wave attributes in both time- and frequency domain, describing the
signal velocity, strength, and shape. We found small variations in
signal velocity (between 0.06-0.07 m/ns) but large variations in both
amplitude and shape (either order of magnitude variation or
doubling/tripling of attribute values). We see that the GPR response
from wetter and more clayey diamicts have both lower amplitudes and
lower centroid frequencies than the response from their drier and
sandier counterparts. Furthermore, we find that the variation in
amplitude and shape attributes are better correlated to the diamicts’
material properties than the signal velocity is.