Understanding Pore-Scale Two-Phase Flow: Coupled C-H & N-S!

S. Sun1,2, J. Chen1, K. Bao2, X.-P. Wang3, and T. Qian3 1Xian Jiaotong University, 2KAUST, and 3HKUST ! !

1 BACKGROUND !
Accurate simulation of subsurface multiphase ow in porous media has important applications in petroleum reservoir engineering and environmental science.! Pore scale modeling of multiphase ow can increase our understanding of porous media multiphase ow, especially for residual saturation, relative permeability and capillary pressure. !

3 METHODOLOGY!
(
u + (u )u) = p + u + t u = 0 in + u = M t in in
NavierStokes equation (N-S)

Convex Splitting Scheme for C-H Equations

Semi-implicit Temporal Scheme for N-S Equations

CahnHilliard equation (C-H)

Here,

= K r + u 3

uslip = ( nu + un ) + L( ) on slip On the slip boundary

+ u = ( L( )) on slip
t

On the slip boundary

On the slip boundary

L( ) = K n + f ( )

1 f ( ) = cos s sin( ) 2 2

Solution Procedure:!

Drummond and Israelachvili 2004

4 RESULTS!
Detachment of Oil Droplets Linking Pore & Darcy Scales: (Relative Perm, Residual Saturation etc) Influence of Wettability

2 Why / PURPOSE!
Wettability has signicant inuence on ow.! Moving contact line: conventional no-slip boundary condition for single-phase ow does not work for two-phase ow. ! Evidence from molecular dynamics simulation indicates slipping boundary conditions. !

E E E E

E E

N
N N N N E E

N
N N N

(a) EEEEEE
W E W W W

(b) NNNNNN

(c) EENNNN
W N W W W

(d) EEWWWW

(e) NNWWWW

Generalized Navier Boundary Condition (Qian, Wang and Sheng 2003)

T. Qian, X. P. Wang, and P. Sheng, Molecular scale contact line hydrodynamics of immiscible ows, Phys. Rew. E 68(2003) 016306.
J. Moortgat, S. Sun and A. Firoozabadi, Compositional modeling of three-phase ow with gravity using higher-order nite element methods, Water Resources Research, 47, W05511, 2011.
K. Bao, Y. Shi, S. Sun, X.P. Wang. A Finite Element Method for the Numerical Solution of the Coupled Cahn-Hilliard and Navier-Stokes System for Moving Contact Line Problems. Journal of Computational Physics, 2012, 231(24): 80838099.

shuyusun@gmail.com!