Remote geologic structural analysis of Yucca Flat

Technical Report · Sun Dec 01 04:00:00 EST 1991

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/5883577· OSTI ID:5883577

Foley, M G; Heasler, P G; Hoover, K A ^[1]; Rynes, N J ^[2]; Thiessen, R L; Alfaro, J L ^[3]

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1. Pacific Northwest Lab., Richland, WA (United States)
2. Northern Illinois Univ., De Kalb, IL (United States)
3. Washington State Univ., Pullman, WA (United States)

The Remote Geologic Analysis (RGA) system was developed by Pacific Northwest Laboratory (PNL) to identify crustal structures that may affect seismic wave propagation from nuclear tests. Using automated methods, the RGA system identifies all valleys in a digital elevation model (DEM), fits three-dimensional vectors to valley bottoms, and catalogs all potential fracture or fault planes defined by coplanar pairs of valley vectors. The system generates a cluster hierarchy of planar features having greater-than-random density that may represent areas of anomalous topography manifesting structural control of erosional drainage development. Because RGA uses computer methods to identify zones of hypothesized control of topography, ground truth using a well-characterized test site was critical in our evaluation of RGA's characterization of inaccessible test sites for seismic verification studies. Therefore, we applied RGA to a study area centered on Yucca Flat at the Nevada Test Site (NTS) and compared our results with both mapped geology and geologic structures and with seismic yield-magnitude models. This is the final report of PNL's RGA development project for peer review within the US Department of Energy Office of Arms Control (OAC) seismic-verification community. In this report, we discuss the Yucca Flat study area, the analytical basis of the RGA system and its application to Yucca Flat, the results of the analysis, and the relation of the analytical results to known topography, geology, and geologic structures. 41 refs., 39 figs., 2 tabs.

• Research Organization: Pacific Northwest Lab., Richland, WA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: DOE; USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
• DOE Contract Number: AC06-76RL01830; FG06-89ER75522
• OSTI ID: 5883577
• Report Number(s): PNL-7887; ON: DE92006874
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

350300 -- Arms Control-- Verification-- (1987-)
45 MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, WEAPONRY, AND NATIONAL DEFENSE
450300 -- Military Technology
Weaponry
& National Defense-- Nuclear Explosion Detection
58 GEOSCIENCES
580000* -- Geosciences
98 NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT, SAFEGUARDS, AND PHYSICAL PROTECTION
COMPUTERIZED SIMULATION
DATA ANALYSIS
DIGITAL SYSTEMS
DIGITIZERS
ELECTRONIC CIRCUITS
GEOLOGIC FAULTS
GEOLOGIC FRACTURES
GEOLOGIC STRUCTURES
GEOLOGY
GROUND TRUTH
LINEAMENTS
MAPPING
NATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS
NEVADA TEST SITE
PULSE CIRCUITS
REMOTE SENSING
SEISMIC WAVES
SIGNAL CONDITIONERS
SIMULATION
STRATIGRAPHY
TOPOGRAPHY
US DOE
US ORGANIZATIONS
VERIFICATION
WAVE PROPAGATION