Connecting Pore Scale Dynamics to Macroscopic Models for Two-Fluid Phase Flow

Abstract:

Imaging technologies such as computed micro-tomography (CMT) provide high resolution three-dimensional images of real porous medium systems that reveal the true geometric structure of fluid and solid phases. Simulation and analysis tools are essential to extract knowledge from this raw data, and can be applied in tandem to provide information that is otherwise inaccessible. Guidance from multi-scale averaging theory is used to develop a multi-scale analysis framework to determine phase connectivity and extract interfacial areas, curvatures, common line length, contact angle and the velocities of the interface and common curve. The approach is applied to analyze pore-scale dynamics based on a multiphase lattice Boltzmann method. Dense sets of simulations are performed to evaluate the equilibrium relationship between capillary pressure, saturation and interfacial area for several experimentally imaged porous media. The approach is also used study the evolution of macroscopic quantities under dynamic conditions, which is compared to the equilibrium data.