Vortex breakdown in shear-thinning liquids: experiment and numerical simulation

Summary The viability of any enhanced-oil-recovery project depends on the ability to inject the displacing fluid at an economic rate. This is typically evaluated using finite-volume numerical simulation. These simulators calculate injectivity using the Peaceman method (Peaceman 1978), which assumes that flow is Newtonian. Most polymer solutions exhibit some degree of non-Newtonian behavior resulting in a changing polymer viscosity with distance from the injection well. For shear-thinning polymer solutions, conventional simulations can overpredict injection-well bottomhole pressure (BHP) by several hundred psi, unless a computationally costly local grid refinement is used in the near-wellboreregion. We show theoretically and numerically that the Peaceman pressure-equivalent radius, based on Darcy flow, is not correct when fluids are shear thinning, and derive an analytical expression for calculating the correct radius. The expression does not depend on any particular functional relationship between polymer-solution viscosity and velocity. We test it using the relationship described by the Meter equation (Meter and Bird 1964) and the Cannella et al. (1988) correlation. Numerical tests indicate that the solution provides a significant improvement in the accuracy of BHP calculations for conventional numerical simulation, reducing or removing the need for expensive local grid refinement around the well when simulating the injection of fluids with shear-thinningnon-Newtonianrheology.

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Numerical simulation of shear-thinning droplet impact on surfaces with different wettability

Acta Physica Sinica ◽

10.7498/aps.69.20191682 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 69 (6) ◽

pp. 064702

Author(s):

Xue-Feng Shen ◽

Yu Cao ◽

Jun-Feng Wang ◽

Hai-Long Liu

Keyword(s):

Numerical Simulation ◽

Shear Thinning ◽

Droplet Impact

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Numerical simulation of the unsteady aerodynamic loads on the tail fin in the vortex breakdown flow

Progress in Computational Fluid Dynamics An International Journal ◽

10.1504/pcfd.2021.10039616 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 21 (5) ◽

pp. 274

Author(s):

Andrey Epikhin

Keyword(s):

Numerical Simulation ◽

Vortex Breakdown ◽

Aerodynamic Loads ◽

Unsteady Aerodynamic

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Numerical Simulation of Vortex Breakdown Using Primitive Variables

Computational Mechanics ’88 ◽

10.1007/978-3-642-61381-4_388 ◽

1988 ◽

pp. 1469-1472

Author(s):

M. D. Salas ◽

G. Kuruvila

Keyword(s):

Numerical Simulation ◽

Vortex Breakdown ◽

Primitive Variables

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Anisotropic Characteristics of Turbulence Dissipation in Swirling Flow: A Direct Numerical Simulation Study

Advances in Mathematical Physics ◽

10.1155/2015/657620 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 2015 ◽

pp. 1-9 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Xingtuan Yang ◽

Nan Gui ◽

Gongnan Xie ◽

Jie Yan ◽

Jiyuan Tu ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Numerical Simulation ◽

Energy Dissipation ◽

Direct Numerical Simulation ◽

Large Scale ◽

Isotropic Turbulence ◽

Vortex Breakdown ◽

Swirling Flow ◽

Turbulent Energy ◽

Swirling Flows ◽

Small Scale

This study investigates the anisotropic characteristics of turbulent energy dissipation rate in a rotating jet flow via direct numerical simulation. The turbulent energy dissipation tensor, including its eigenvalues in the swirling flows with different rotating velocities, is analyzed to investigate the anisotropic characteristics of turbulence and dissipation. In addition, the probability density function of the eigenvalues of turbulence dissipation tensor is presented. The isotropic subrange of PDF always exists in swirling flows relevant to small-scale vortex structure. Thus, with remarkable large-scale vortex breakdown, the isotropic subrange of PDF is reduced in strongly swirling flows, and anisotropic energy dissipation is proven to exist in the core region of the vortex breakdown. More specifically, strong anisotropic turbulence dissipation occurs concentratively in the vortex breakdown region, whereas nearly isotropic turbulence dissipation occurs dispersively in the peripheral region of the strong swirling flows.

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