B43B-0545
Benchmark Study of 3D Pore-scale Flow and Solute Transport Simulation Methods

Thursday, 17 December 2015
Poster Hall (Moscone South)
Timothy D Scheibe1, Xiaofan Yang1, Yashar Mehmani2, William A Perkins1, Andrea Pasquali3, Martin Schoenherr3, Kyungjoo Kim4, Mauro Perego4, Michael L Parks4, Nathaniel Trask5, Matthew Balhoff6, Marshall C Richmond1, Martin Geier3, Manfred Krafczyk3, Li-Shi Luo7 and Alexandre M Tartakovsky1, (1)Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Richland, WA, United States, (2)Stanford University, Energy Resources Engineering, Stanford, CA, United States, (3)Technische Universitat Braunschweig, Braunschweig, Germany, (4)Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, NM, United States, (5)Brown University, Providence, RI, United States, (6)University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, United States, (7)Old Dominion University, Norfolk, VA, United States
Abstract:
Multiple numerical approaches have been developed to simulate porous media fluid flow and solute transport at the pore scale. These include 1) methods that explicitly model the three-dimensional geometry of pore spaces and 2) methods that conceptualize the pore space as a topologically consistent set of stylized pore bodies and pore throats. In previous work we validated a model of the first type, using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) codes employing standard finite volume method (FVM), against magnetic resonance velocimetry (MRV) measurements of pore-scale velocities. Here we expand that benchmark study to include additional models of the first type based on the immersed-boundary method (IMB), lattice Boltzmann method (LBM), and smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH), as well as a model of the second type, a pore-network model (PNM). While the PNM approach is computationally much less demanding than direct numerical simulation methods, the effect of conceptualizing complex three-dimensional pore geometries in the manner of PNMs has not been fully determined. We apply all five approaches (FVM-based CFD, IMB, LBM, SPH and PNM) to simulate pore-scale velocity distributions and nonreactive solute transport, and intercompare the model results. Comparisons are drawn both in terms of macroscopic variables (e.g., permeability, solute breakthrough curves) and microscopic variables (e.g., local velocities and concentrations). Generally good agreement was achieved among the various approaches, but some differences were observed depending on the model context. The benchmark study was challenging because of variable capabilities of the codes, and inspired some code enhancements to allow consistent comparison of flow and transport simulations across the full suite of methods. This study provides support for confidence in a variety of pore-scale modeling methods, and motivates further development and application of pore-scale simulation methods.

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