Numerical Analysis of Two-Phase Flow in Porous Media with Finite Element Method
Qiang Bai, Takeshi Hyuga and Yasunobu Fujita
A numerical procedure for analyzing two-phase flow and heat transfer in porous media is presented. A two-phase mixture model developed by Wang and Beckermann was employed in the formulation using the finite element method (FEM). To extend the present algorithm to a wider range of velocities an extended Forchheimer-Darcy law was introduced. Conservation equations of mass, momentum and energy were discretized by FEM on quadrilateral elements using an equal-order interpolation. The problem Wang and Beckermann analyzed, i.e., boiling in a square, two-dimensional porous enclosure heated on the bottom, was simulated to validate the proposed algorithm. Good agreement was confirmed between both simulations. Pool and flow boiling from a horizontal cylinder embedded in a porous rectangle were then numerically analyzed.