Heat storage in aquifers: buoyancy flow and thermal-stratification problems

Technical Report · Mon Oct 01 04:00:00 EDT 1979

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/5273153· OSTI ID:5273153

Hellstrom, G.; Tsang, C. F.; Claesson, J.

Heat Storage in aquifers involves injecting warm water into a confined aquifer and recovering the heat later by pumping out the warm water. Heat loss in the aquifers is roughly proportional to the area of the warm storage region which may be increased to unacceptable levels by buoyancy effects. Thermohydraulic problems in heat storage aquifers, methods for predicting the buoyancy flow, and changes in the thermal front within different aquifer types are discussed. Some general observations are made. Results of some analytical solutions are presented. The superposition of forced and natural convection is dealt with. Formulas for the tilting of the thermal front as a function of time are given. These are tested against numerical simulations and applied to laboratory and field experiments. The different results, formulas, and tilting criteria are summarized.

• Research Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Lab., CA (USA); Lund Inst. of Tech. (Sweden). Dept. of Mathematical Physics
• DOE Contract Number: W-7405-ENG-48
• OSTI ID: 5273153
• Report Number(s): LBL-14246; ON: DE82013881
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

25 ENERGY STORAGE
250600* -- Energy Storage-- Thermal
42 ENGINEERING
420400 -- Engineering-- Heat Transfer & Fluid Flow
AQUIFERS
COMPUTERIZED SIMULATION
DATA
ENERGY LOSSES
ENERGY STORAGE
ENERGY TRANSFER
EXPERIMENTAL DATA
FLOW RATE
FLUID MECHANICS
GROUND WATER
HEAT LOSSES
HEAT STORAGE
HEAT TRANSFER
HOT WATER
HYDRODYNAMICS
HYDROGEN COMPOUNDS
INFORMATION
INJECTION WELLS
LOSSES
MATHEMATICAL MODELS
MECHANICS
NUMERICAL DATA
OXYGEN COMPOUNDS
SENSIBLE HEAT STORAGE
SIMULATION
STORAGE
THEORETICAL DATA
WATER
WELLS