Evaluation of wave-induced flow through marine porous media accounting for transition of seepage properties across multiple flow regimes

Abstract

Wave-induced flow through marine porous media has been attracting coastal engineers and researchers because of their strong correlation with scouring, internal erosion, piping and other destructions of marine porous structures. Previous studies chose Darcy-Forchheimer equation for wave-induced seepage behavior analyses because of its simplicity and perceptiveness. However, numerous experiment observations suggested that significant flow regime transition occurred in porous media with high variations in porosity and particle size, while Darcy-Forchheimer equation is only applicable to flow within Forchheimer regime. In this paper, a mathematical model linking the resistance of porous medium to its porosity and particle size is proposed to characterize the seepage properties across Darcy and Forchheimer regime under wave loadings. The proposed seepage model is then incorporated into volume-averaged Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes equations, and thus enabling evaluating fluid motions in waves and marine porous media via a unified framework. Through validation against experimental observations, analytical solutions and well accepted computed results in the literature, the proposed model is shown to replicate the characteristics of resistance of porous media with different porosities and particle sizes under different flow regimes. Numerical analyses are conducted to elucidate that seepage velocities of wave-induced flow in marine porous materials can be over- or under-estimated if not considering transitional seepage properties across multiple flow regimes. Such discrepancies can become significant when strong variations occur in porous media with respect to particle size and/or porosity.