Dispersion of a Fluid Plume During Radial Injection in an Aquifer
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Date
2022-02
Authors
Hyatt, Benjamin W.A.
Leonenko, Yuri
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
AIP
Abstract
This study outlines a model for radial injected fluid flow with mechanical dispersion in a vertically confined porous
aquifer. Existing studies have investigated fully segregated fluid flow in this setting, where the injected fluid and
resident fluid form a propagating sharp interface. The present study uses the geometry of these sharp interfaces as a
basis for the velocity field to take into account dispersion and buoyancy/viscosity effects. By differentiating the radial
position of the sharp interface with respect to time, a time dependent radial velocity field governing the flow is obtained.
Evaluating this radial velocity at the moment the original interface were to intersect a given position gives a velocity
field which is a function of the position coordinates inside the aquifer. Using this velocity field, the fluids saturation
profile resulting from mechanical dispersion can be found analytically. It is shown that the concentration of the injected
fluid smoothly decays around the position of the corresponding sharp interface, allowing for the injected fluid to be
present in detectable quantities beyond the extent of these solutions. This concentration spread should be considered in
defining outer boundaries on fluids in injection well projects such as carbon sequestration or groundwater applications.
Description
The following article appeared in Physics of Fluids 34, 026603 (2022) and may be found at https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0078474. This article may be downloaded for personal use only. Any other use requires prior permission of the author and AIP Publishing.
Keywords
aquifer, fluids, groundwater applications