Receiver orientation and event back-azimuth estimation for downhole microseismic monitoring using a probabilistic method based on P-wave polarization

Microseismic event back-azimuth is an indispensable parameter for source localization in downhole microseismic monitoring, and the accurate orientation of horizontal components seismic receivers vital reliably determining back-azimuth. Variation monitoring data quality may jeopardize accuracy receiver which will further affect estimation. To mitigate this issue, we proposed a new probabilistic method based on P-wave polarization analysis The algorithm constructs von Mises distribution function using angle corresponding rectilinearity P-wave, then determines target maximum probability function. having highest from active-source used to quantify reliable absolute angle, relative angles are calculated by distributions measurement differences associated averages all events. After orientation, with different values applied construct functions estimate back-azimuths. By high-quality events multi-receiver recordings, our methodology can greatly reduce unintentional error increase accuracy. We investigate feasibility reliability both synthetic field data. results demonstrate that, compared conventional methods, minimize variance weighted standard deviation demonstrates that improve dataset.