Lecture 8 – Heat Transfer in Porous Media

15.0 Release

Heat Transfer Modeling using

ANSYS Fluent
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 Agenda

• Introduction

• Porous Media Characterization

• The Representative Elementary Volume (REV) Concept

• Theory

• The Standard Approach Used in FLUENT

• Non-Equilibrium Heat Transfer – Two-Equation Model

• Conclusions

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 Introduction

• Industrial examples
• Fuel cells
• Catalytic converters
• Filters
• Food products
• Like in all multiphase or heterogeneous systems, transport phenomena are
important.
• The focus of this presentation is mainly heat transfer by convection
• Introduction to the elementary representative volume concept
• Governing equations
• Closure model
• Two models for predicting porous media heat transfer
• One-equation model (local thermal equilibrium model)
• Two-equation model (non-equilibrium model)

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 Agenda

• Introduction

• Porous Media Characterization

• The Representative Elementary Volume (REV) Concept

• Theory

• The Standard Approach Used in FLUENT

• Non-Equilibrium Heat Transfer – Two-Equation Model

• Conclusions

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 Porous Media Characterization

• Definition
• Porous media is a solid with many
complex pores.
• Shape and connectivity of the
pores are important.

• Porous media exhibits large Steel Filter Steel Fiber Porous Match
diversity in (Ordered Structure) (Random Structure)

• Structure (shape)
• Nature
• Spatial scales

Sand Pack
(Random Structure)

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 Porous Media Characterization

• Transfer phenomena in porous media strongly depend on solid

matrix geometry.

• Characteristic variables for porous media

• Porosity (defined as the ratio of void volume to total volume)
• Global porosity – percentage of pore volume or void space, or that volume
within the porous region that can contain fluids
Global Volume
  1
Solid Matrix Volume

• Effective porosity – the interconnected pore volume or void space in a rock

that contributes to fluid flow. Effective porosity excludes isolated pores and
is therefore typically less than the global porosity.
Volume of Active Pore Spaces
 eff 
Sample Volume
• Specific surface area – Ratio of interfacial area to specific volume
Fluid - Solid Interfacial Area
AS 
Sample Volume
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 Agenda

• Introduction

• Porous Media Characterization

• The Representative Elementary Volume (REV) Concept

• Theory

• The Standard Approach Used in FLUENT

• Non-Equilibrium Heat Transfer – Two-Equation Model

• Conclusions

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 Representative Elementary Volume

• Geometric problem
• Two largely different length scales
• Pore or grain scale, d
• Porous media length scale, L >> d
• In general, solving the flow field at the pore scale is impractical

• Can we describe the flow field at a larger, more practical scale?

• Concept of upscaling
• Method of volumetric averaging

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 Representative Elementary Volume

• Representative elementary volume

• Large enough to characterize the material
• Small enough to maintain spatial description

d Computational
r Domain

L
Volumetric
Averaging
Pore scale REV scale Local Discretization

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 Agenda

• Introduction

• Porous Media Characterization

• The Representative Elementary Volume (REV) Concept

• Theory

• The Standard Approach Used in FLUENT

• Non-Equilibrium Heat Transfer – Two-Equation Model

• Conclusions

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 Assumptions and Limitations

• The porous media model in FLUENT introduces flow resistance

parameters that can be obtained either analytically or empirically.
• Porous zones remain fluid type.
• Sink terms are included in the momentum equations which account for the
resistance forces of solid materials onto the fluid.

• The porous media treatment is subject to the following assumptions

and limitations:
• The volume blockage that is physically present is not modeled. Instead, a
superficial velocity is calculated which represents the fluid velocity through
the porous zone.
• Interaction between porous media and turbulence is approximated.

• Other limitations apply. Refer to Chapter 6.2.3 of the FLUENT 15 User

Guide.

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 Theory

• In porous zones, the continuity equation remains unchanged,

except that it is formulated in terms of superficial velocity.

  f     f U  0
t

• Momentum equation contains an additional body force term, F

 f  U 
    f U U   P    τ   g  F Cij  U U
t Fi   Dij  U j  
Viscous Terms j j 2
• For homogenous porous media:
U  U U
F    C2  Inertial Terms
  2 

Permeability Inertial resistance factor

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 Agenda

• Introduction

• Porous Media Characterization

• The Representative Elementary Volume (REV) Concept

• Theory

• The Standard Approach Used in FLUENT

• Non-Equilibrium Heat Transfer – Two-Equation Model

• Conclusions

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 Standard Approach Used in FLUENT

• FLUENT uses the local equilibrium (one-equation) approach.

This roughly means that the local fluid temperature is
approximately equal to the porous matrix temperature.

• Range of application:
• Situations where there is local heat balance in porous media
• Limited to partial anisotropy

• Energy equation  Tpm 

 C p pm   U  Tpm     keff Tpm 
 t 

 C  1      C 
p s p f 

• How do we determine the effective conductivity?

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 Local Equilibrium (One Equation Model)

 T f 
Fluid part:  C    U  T f     k f T f 
d

p f
 t 
Ts
Solid part:  C     k s Ts 
t
p s
Pore Scale, d

Upscaling
(Phase Averaging)

 Tpm 
 C  
pm 
 U  T pm 
    k pm  kd  Tpm 
 t
p

 C  1      C 
p s p f 
Closure model
Real conductivity matrices

k pm  f (k f , ks , , structure)
REV or Domain Scale
kd  f (microscopic velocity field heterogene ity)

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 Closure Model

• Volumetric averaging introduces effective conductivity matrices.

• Matrices depend on
• Thermal conductivity of each void,
• Material porosity,
• Solid matrix structures,
• Thermal dispersion – Consequence of microscopic velocity field
heterogeneity
• Several methods exist to characterize these matrices
• Experimental
• Geometric
• Empirical
• Local numerical simulation

• Characterization is a complex problem and will not be discussed

in this presentation.

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 Effective Thermal Conductivity

• Isotropic porous media

• For isotropic porous media, the effective conductivity can be estimated
using a porosity-weighted average of fluid and solid parts.
keff  k f   ks 1   
• UDF is needed in order to simulate spatial dependence.
• Anisotropic porous media
• For anisotropic porous media, effective conductivity can be estimated using
porosity-weighted average of fluid scalar conductivity and solid conductivity
matrix.
• Spatial dependence is possible via UDF.
k f 0 0  k11 s k12 s k13 s 
keff     0 kf
 
0   1    k 21 s k22 s k23 s 
0
 0 k f  k31 s k32 s k33 s 
Fluid contribution Solid contribution

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 Standard Approach Used in FLUENT
Cell Zone Conditions Edit...

• User-defined effective
conductivity
• Fluids – Scalar value
• Solids – Scalar or matrix value

Materials Solid Create/Edit…

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 Agenda

• Introduction

• Porous Media Characterization

• The Representative Elementary Volume (REV) Concept

• Theory

• The Standard Approach Used in FLUENT

• Non-Equilibrium Heat Transfer – Two-Equation Model

• Conclusions

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 Non-Equilibrium Heat Transfer

• Range of validity
• Thermal equilibrium is not assumed
• Isotropic heat transfer

• Two separate but coupled energy equations are solved.

• Energy equation for the fluid region
• Energy equation for the solid matrix region

• In the non-equilibrium case, the system of governing equations require

additional closure relationships.
• Fluid thermal dispersion (isotropic)
• Solid thermal diffusion (isotropic)
• Exchange coefficient at fluid-solid interface

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 Non-Equilibrium Heat Transfer

• Dual cell approach where solid zone is spatially coincident with the porous
fluid zone:

• Solid conservation equation:

 1    s Es
   1   k s Ts   S sh  h fs A fs T f  Ts 
t
• Fluid conservation equation:
 f E f    
  U f E f  p      k f T f    hi J i   τ  U   S hf  h fs A fs Ts  T f 

t   i  
Es ...total solid medium energy
E f ...total fluid energy
h fs ... heat transfer coefficient for fluid/solid interface
A fs ... interfacial area density
S hf ... fluid enthalpy source term
S sh ... solid enthalpy source term

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 Agenda

• Introduction

• Porous Media Characterization

• The Representative Elementary Volume (REV) Concept

• Theory

• The Standard Approach Used in FLUENT

• Non-Equilibrium Heat Transfer – Two-Equation Model

• Conclusions

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 Conclusions

• Convective heat transfer in porous media can be approached in

FLUENT using two different methods.
• One-Equation Model
• Two-Equation Model

• Closure model remains a complex problem.

• Effective conductivity characterization
• Specific heat transfer coefficient in porous media.

• It is possible to introduce a diffusivity matrix in the energy equation

solved for solid region.
• Presented approach can be generalized either directly or via UDF.
• Anisotropic thermal conductivity in solid zone (matrix structure effect).
• Thermal dispersion matrix in fluid zone (velocity field heterogeneity effect)

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 References

• Kaviany (1999), Principles of Heat Transfer in Porous Media,

Springer-Verlag.

• Quintard, Modélisation des Transferts Thermiques dans un Milieu

Poreux.

• FLUENT Inc. (2003), User-Group Meeting, France.

• Quintard, Transfert en Milieux Poreux, http://mquintard.free.fr

• Bories and Prat, Transferts de chaleur dans les milieux poreux.

• Techniques de l’Ingénieur, traité Génie Énergétique

• Bories, Transferts en Milieux Poreux, DEA ENSEEIHT

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