Patent ID: 7983885

Claim:
A computer implemented method for identifying regions in a ground formation at a well site, the computer implemented method comprising: receiving continuous data comprising seismic data from the well site and strength profile data; reducing redundancies in the continuous data to form processed data; performing, using a processor of a computer, a cluster analysis of heterogeneity in the ground formation using the processed data to form a set of cluster units, wherein each cluster unit of the set of cluster units is a different type of cluster unit that identifies differences between regions in the ground formation at the well site; obtaining multi-dimensional data comprising discrete well site data for each type of cluster unit in the set of cluster units; identifying properties for each type of cluster unit in the set of cluster units using the discrete well site data to form a model for the well site; selecting sidewall plug locations for the set of cluster units in each of the regions of the ground formation based on the identified properties of each type of cluster unit, wherein the sidewall plug locations are not at regular intervals; obtaining a plurality of sidewall plugs from the sidewall plug locations in each of the regions along a length of a wellbore in the ground formation, wherein the plurality of sidewall plugs comprises at least one sidewall plug for each type of cluster unit in the set of cluster units; and verifying compliance of the model with a threshold by comparing the identified properties along the length of the wellbore with measured properties of the plurality of sidewall plugs.