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Title: Impact of viscous fingering and permeability heterogeneity on fluid mixing in porous media

Abstract

Fluid mixing plays a fundamental role in many natural and engineered processes, including groundwater flows in porous media, enhanced oil recovery, and microfluidic lab-on-a-chip systems. Recent developments have explored the effect of viscosity contrast on mixing, suggesting that the unstable displacement of fluids with different viscosities, or viscous fingering, provides a powerful mechanism to increase fluid-fluid interfacial area and enhance mixing. However, existing studies have not incorporated the effect of medium heterogeneity on the mixing rate. Here, we characterize the evolution of mixing between two fluids of different viscosity in heterogeneous porous media. We focus on a practical scenario of divergent-convergent flow in a quarter five spot geometry prototypical of well-driven groundwater flows. We study by means of numerical simulations the impact of permeability heterogeneity and viscosity contrast on the breakthrough curves and mixing efficiency, and we rationalize the nontrivial mixing behavior that emerges from the competition between the creation of fluid-fluid interfacial area and channeling.

Authors:
 [1];  [1];  [2];  [1]
+ Show Author Affiliations
  1. Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States)
  2. Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States); Technical Univ. of Madrid (Spain)
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES)
OSTI Identifier:
1557837
Grant/Contract Number:  
SC0003907
Resource Type:
Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
Water Resources Research
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 51; Journal Issue: 4; Journal ID: ISSN 0043-1397
Publisher:
American Geophysical Union (AGU)
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
58 GEOSCIENCES

Citation Formats

Nicolaides, Christos, Jha, Birendra, Cueto‐Felgueroso, Luis, and Juanes, Ruben. Impact of viscous fingering and permeability heterogeneity on fluid mixing in porous media. United States: N. p., 2015. Web. doi:10.1002/2014WR015811.
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Nicolaides, Christos, Jha, Birendra, Cueto‐Felgueroso, Luis, & Juanes, Ruben. Impact of viscous fingering and permeability heterogeneity on fluid mixing in porous media. United States. https://doi.org/10.1002/2014WR015811
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Nicolaides, Christos, Jha, Birendra, Cueto‐Felgueroso, Luis, and Juanes, Ruben. Mon . "Impact of viscous fingering and permeability heterogeneity on fluid mixing in porous media". United States. https://doi.org/10.1002/2014WR015811. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1557837.
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@article{osti_1557837,
title = {Impact of viscous fingering and permeability heterogeneity on fluid mixing in porous media},
author = {Nicolaides, Christos and Jha, Birendra and Cueto‐Felgueroso, Luis and Juanes, Ruben},
abstractNote = {Fluid mixing plays a fundamental role in many natural and engineered processes, including groundwater flows in porous media, enhanced oil recovery, and microfluidic lab-on-a-chip systems. Recent developments have explored the effect of viscosity contrast on mixing, suggesting that the unstable displacement of fluids with different viscosities, or viscous fingering, provides a powerful mechanism to increase fluid-fluid interfacial area and enhance mixing. However, existing studies have not incorporated the effect of medium heterogeneity on the mixing rate. Here, we characterize the evolution of mixing between two fluids of different viscosity in heterogeneous porous media. We focus on a practical scenario of divergent-convergent flow in a quarter five spot geometry prototypical of well-driven groundwater flows. We study by means of numerical simulations the impact of permeability heterogeneity and viscosity contrast on the breakthrough curves and mixing efficiency, and we rationalize the nontrivial mixing behavior that emerges from the competition between the creation of fluid-fluid interfacial area and channeling.},
doi = {10.1002/2014WR015811},
journal = {Water Resources Research},
number = 4,
volume = 51,
place = {United States},
year = {Mon Mar 16 00:00:00 EDT 2015},
month = {Mon Mar 16 00:00:00 EDT 2015}
}
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https://doi.org/10.1002/2014WR015811
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    Works referencing / citing this record:

    Control of viscous fingering and mixing in miscible displacements with time-dependent rates
    journal, September 2018

    • Yuan, Qingwang; Zhou, Xiang; Wang, Jinjie
    • AIChE Journal, Vol. 65, Issue 1
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    Stable and unstable miscible displacements in layered porous media
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    • Nijjer, Japinder S.; Hewitt, Duncan R.; Neufeld, Jerome A.
    • Journal of Fluid Mechanics, Vol. 869
    • DOI: 10.1017/jfm.2019.190

    Stable and unstable miscible displacements in layered porous media.
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    • Nijjer, Japinder S.; Hewitt, Duncan; Neufeld, Jerome
    • Apollo - University of Cambridge Repository
    • DOI: 10.17863/cam.44827
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