The migration and deposition of suspended particles within porous media is of great significance in many applications such as sewage treatment, pollutant purification and well drilling. Especially in the oil industry, the deposition of small particles in the reservoir may affect the recovery of crude oil. The structure of porous media is complex, making it difficult to understand the details of the flow field. Therefore, it is necessary to explore the phenomena and mechanism of suspended particle flow in porous media. The lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) is used to numerically simulate the flow characteristics of suspended particles in porous media. The skeleton particles and suspended particles are constructed by the finite size particle (FSP) method. The Half-Way bounce back format is adopted to realize the interactions between suspended particles and the fluid. By changing the inlet velocity of the liquid phase, porosity and particle diameter, the movement and deposition of suspended particles are analyzed. The simulation results show that the increase in the inlet velocity of the liquid shortens the migration trajectory of the suspended particles and improves the contact force of the particle. There are a large number of suspended particles clogging near the inlet of porous media. The particle retention time and the particle deposition rate decrease with the increase of the inlet velocity, while the granular temperature shows the opposite trend. Meanwhile, the granular temperature first increases and then decreases, and gradually tends to be stable with time passing by. The reduction of porosity strengthens the collisions between the suspended particles. The change of porosity from 0.581 to 0.400 increases the granular temperature by 9 times. As the porosity is enhanced, the particle axial velocity increases, while the particle contact force declines. The granular temperature is raised with the increase of the particle diameter, and the maximum value of the particle axial velocity can reach 11 times of the inlet velocity.
CHENG Bin-Tao
,
WANG Shu-Yan
,
SHAO Bao-Li
,
YUAN Zi-Han
,
XIE Lei
. Lattice Boltzmann simulation of particle flow characteristics in porous media[J]. The Chinese Journal of Process Engineering, 2023
, 23(2)
: 188
-198
.
DOI: 10.12034/j.issn.1009-606X.222038