ABSTRACTMultiphase fluid and heat flow plays an important role in many problems relating to the disposal of nuclear wastes in geologic media. Examples include boiling and condensation processes near heat-generating wastes, flow of water and formation gas in partially saturated formations, evolution of a free gas phase from waste package corrosion in initially water-saturated environments, and redistribution (dissolution, transport, and precipitation) of rock minerals in non-isothermal flow fields. Such processes may strongly impact upon waste package and repository design considerations and performance.This paper summarizes important physical phenomena occurring in multiphase and nonisother-mal flows, as well as techniques for their mathematical modeling and numerical simulation. Illustrative applications are given for a number of specific fluid and heat flow problems, including: ther-mohydrologic conditions near heat-generating waste packages in the unsaturated zone; repository-wide convection effects in the unsaturated zone; effects of quartz dissolution and precipitation for disposal in the saturated zone; and gas pressurization and flow effects from corrosion of low-level waste packages.
Modeling Studies of Multiphase Fluid and Heat Flow Processes in Nuclear Waste Isolation
