Effects of heterogeneity on density-driven convection in porous media

ORAL

Abstract

In the context of geological sequestration of carbon dioxide, it is well known that convective transport is expected to play a crucial role in accelerating the rate of carbon dioxide dissolution into the brine present in the aquifer. Most previous studies of this convective process have considered a homogeneous porous medium. However, the properties of the aquifer are known to be extremely heterogeneous over all length scales. Previous research on convection in heterogeneous media has suggested that global quantities like Rayleigh number etc. may be inadequate for describing convective transport in such systems. ~In this work, we consider the process of density-driven convection in heterogeneous porous media using detailed numerical simulations with a Monte-Carlo approach. We present results using an averaged global Rayleigh number and show that it can be extremely useful in predicting convective transport in heterogeneous media. We also discuss the role played by the properties of the medium heterogeneity, and analyze the uncertainty in the predictions as the variance of the permeability field is increased.

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Authors

  • Saikiran Rapaka

    Johns Hopkins University

  • Rajesh Pawar

    Los Alamos National Laboratory

  • Philip Stauffer

    Los Alamos National Laboratory

  • George Zyvoloski

    Los Alamos National Laboratory

  • Dongxiao Zhang

    University of Oklahoma

  • Shiyi Chen

    Department of Mechanical Engineering, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, Department of Mechanical Engineering, the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218 and CoE and CCSE, Peking University, Beijing, China, Johns Hopkins University \& Peking University, Johns Hopkins University