Tag: saturation overshoot

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Porous Media Two-Phase Flow

Stable Propagation of Saturation Overshoots for Two-Phase Flow in Porous Media

M. Schneider, T. Köppl, R. Helmig, R. Steinle, R. Hilfer

Transport in Porous Media 121, 621-641 (2018)
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11242-017-0977-y

submitted on
Tuesday, March 21, 2017

Propagation of saturationovershoots for two-phaseflow of immiscible and incompressible fluids in porous media is analyzed using different computational methods. In particular, it is investigated under which conditions a given saturation overshoot remains stable while moving through a porous medium. Two standard formulations are employed in this investigation, a fractional flow formulation and a pressure–saturation formulation. Neumann boundary conditions for pressure are shown to emulate flux boundary conditions in homogeneous media. Gravity driven flows with Dirichlet boundary conditions for pressure that model infiltration into heterogeneous media with position-dependent permeability are found to exhibit pronounced saturation overshoots very similar to those seen in experiment.



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fluid flow Porous Media Simulations Two-Phase Flow

Hysteresis in relative permeabilities suffices for propagation of saturation overshoot: A quantitative comparison with experiment

R. Steinle, R. Hilfer

Physical Review E 95, 043112 (2017)
https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.95.043112

submitted on
Wednesday, December 21, 2016

Traditional Darcy theory for two-phase flow in porous media is shown to predict the propagation of nonmonotone saturation profiles, also known as saturation overshoot. The phenomenon depends sensitively on the constitutive parameters, on initial conditions, and on boundary conditions. Hysteresis in relative permeabilities is needed to observe the effect. Two hysteresis models are discussed and compared. The shape of overshoot solutions can change as a function of time or remain fixed and time independent. Traveling-wave-like overshoot profiles of fixed width exist in experimentally accessible regions of parameter space. They are compared quantitatively against experiment.



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Porous Media Two-Phase Flow

Non-monotonic Travelling Wave Fronts in a System of Fractional Flow Equations from Porous Media

O. Hönig, P. Zegeling, F. Doster, R. Hilfer

Transport in Porous Media 114, 309-340 (2016)
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11242-015-0618-2

submitted on
Sunday, May 31, 2015

Motivated by observations of saturation overshoot, this article investigates generic classes of smooth travelling wave solutions of a system of two coupled nonlinear parabolic partial differential equations resulting from a flux function of high symmetry. All boundary resp. limit value problems of the travelling wave ansatz, which lead to smooth travelling wave solutions, are systematically explored. A complete, visually and computationally useful representation of the five-dimensional manifold connecting wave velocities and boundary resp. limit data is found by using methods from dynamical systems theory. The travelling waves exhibit monotonic, non-monotonic or plateau-shaped behaviour. Special attention is given to the non-monotonic profiles. The stability of the travelling waves is studied by numerically solving the full system of the partial differential equations with an efficient and accurate adaptive moving grid solver.



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fluid flow Porous Media Two-Phase Flow

Influence of Initial Conditions on Propagation, Growth and Decay of Saturation Overshoot

R. Steinle, R. Hilfer

Transport in Porous Media 111, 369-380 (2016)
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11242-015-0598-2

submitted on
Monday, November 24, 2014

A sequence of drainage and imbibition shocks within the traditional theory of two-phase immiscible displacement can give rise to shallow non-monotone saturation profiles as shown in Hilfer and Steinle (Eur Phys J Spec Top 223:2323, 2014). This phenomenon depends sensitively on model parameters and initial conditions. The dependence of saturation overshoot on initial conditions is investigated more systematically in this article. The results allow to determine regions in the parameter space for the observation of saturation overshoot and to explore limitations of the underlying idealized hysteresis model. Numerical solutions of the nonlinear partial differential equations of motion reveal a strong dependence of the overshoot phenomenon on the boundary and initial conditions. Overshoot solutions with experimentally detectable height are shown to exist numerically. Extensive parameter studies reveal different classes of initial conditions for which the width of the overshoot region can decrease, increase or remain constant.



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