Rough interfaces and ultrasonic imaging logging behind casing

Ultrasonic leaky Lamb waves are sensitive to defects and debonding in multilayer media. In this study, we use the finite-difference method to simulate the response of flexural waves in the presence of defects owing to casing corrosion and rough fluctuations at the cement-formation interface. The ultrasonic obliquely incidence could effectively stimulate the flexural waves. The defects owing to casing corrosion change the amplitude of the early arrival flexural wave, which gradually decrease with increasing defect thickness on the exterior walls and is the lowest when the defect length and wavelength were comparable. The scattering at the defects decreases the energy of flexural waves in the casing that leaks directly to fluids. For rough cement-formation interface, the early-arrival flexural waves do not change, whereas the late-arrival flexural waves have reduced amplitude owing to the scattering at rough interface.