An Efficient Method to Compute Capillary Pressure Functions and Saturation-Dependent Permeabilities in Porous Domains Spanning Several Length Scales

Abstract

A method for calculating capillary pressure functions and saturation-dependent permeabilities of geometries containing several length scales is presented. The method does not require the exact geometries of the smaller length scales. Instead, it requires the effective two-phase flow parameters. It does this by generating phase distributions that form static equilibria at a selected capillary pressure value, similar to pore-morphology methods. Within a porous material, the effective parameters are used to obtain the corresponding phase saturation. It is shown how these phase distributions can be used in geometries spanning several length scales to calculate the capillary pressure function and saturation-dependent permeabilities. The method is tested on a geometry containing a simple isotropic porous material and it is applied to a complex textile stack geometry from a liquid composite molding process. In this geometry, three different length scales can be distinguished. The effective two-phase flow parameters of the textile stack are calculated by the proposed method, avoiding expensive simulations.