The Richards equation is a nonlinear parabolic equation that is commonly used for modelling saturated/unsaturated flow in porous media. We assume that the medium occupies a bounded Lipschitz domain partitioned into two disjoint subdomains separated by a fixed interface $Γ$. This leads to two problems defined on the subdomains which are coupled through conditions expressing flux and pressure continuity at $Γ$. After an Euler implicit discretisation of the resulting nonlinear subproblems a linear iterative ($L$-type) domain decomposition scheme is proposed. The convergence of the scheme is proved rigorously. In the last part we present numerical results that are in line with the theoretical finding, in particular the unconditional convergence of the scheme. We further compare the scheme to other approaches not making use of a domain decomposition. Namely, we compare to a Newton and a Picard scheme. We show that the proposed scheme is more stable than the Newton scheme while remaining comparable in computational time, even if no parallelisation is being adopted. Finally we present a parametric study that can be used to optimize the proposed scheme.
In this article we formulate a stable computational nonlocal poromechanics model for dynamic analysis of saturated porous media. As a novelty, the stabilization formulation eliminates zero-energy modes associated with the original multiphase correspondence constitutive models in the coupled nonlocal poromechanics model. The two-phase stabilization scheme is formulated based on an energy method that incorporates inhomogeneous solid deformation and fluid flow. In this method, the nonlocal formulations of skeleton strain energy and fluid flow dissipation energy equate to their local formulations.…
In this paper, we study a model for the transport of an external component, e.g., a surfactant, in variably saturated porous media. We discretize the model in time and space by combining a backward Euler method with the linear Galerkin finite elements. The Newton method and the L-Scheme are employed for the linearization and the performance of these schemes is studied numerically. A special focus is set on the effects of dynamic capillarity on the transport equation.
In this article, we present new random walk methods to solve flow and transport problems in unsaturated/saturated porous media, including coupled flow and transport processes in soils, heterogeneous systems modeled through random hydraulic conductivity and recharge fields, processes at the field and regional scales. The numerical schemes are based on global random walk algorithms (GRW) which approximate the solution by moving large numbers of computational particles on regular lattices according to specific random walk rules. To cope with the nonlinearity and the degeneracy of the Richards equ…
The two-scale computational homogenization method is proposed for modelling of locally periodic fluid-saturated media subjected a to large deformation induced by quasistatic loading. The periodic heterogeneities are relevant to the mesoscopic scale at which a double porous medium constituted by hyperelastic skeleton and an incompressible viscous fluid is featured by large contrasts in the permeability. Within the Eulerian framework related to the current deformed configuration, the two-scale homogenization approach is applied to a linearized model discretized in time, being associated with an …
In this paper, we describe a soil-fluid-structure interaction model that combines soil mechanics (saturated sediments), fluid mechanics (seawater or air), and solid mechanics (structures). The formulation combines the Material Point Method, which models large deformation of the porous media and the structure, with the Implicit Continuous-fluid Eulerian, which models complex fluid flows. We validate the model and simulate the whole process of earthquake-induced submarine landslides. We show that this model captures complex interactions between saturated sediment, seawater, and structure, so we …
Reactive transport in saturated/unsaturated porous media is numerically upscaled to the space-time scale of a hypothetical measurement through coarse-grained space-time (CGST) averages. The reactive transport is modeled at the fine-grained Darcy scale by the actual number of molecules involved in reactions which undergo advective and diffusive movements described by global random walk (GRW) simulations. The CGST averages verify identities similar to a local balance equation which allow us to derive expressions for the flow velocity and the intrinsic diffusion coefficient in terms of averaged m…
In this work we consider the transport of a surfactant in a variably saturated porous media. The water flow is modelled by the Richards equations and it is fully coupled with the transport equation for the surfactant. Three linearization techniques are discussed: the Newton method, the modified Picard and the L-scheme. Based on these, monolithic and splitting schemes are proposed and their convergence is analyzed. The performance of these schemes is illustrated on four numerical examples. For these examples, the number of iterations and the condition numbers of the linear systems emerging in e…
In this article we present a goal-oriented adaptive finite element method for a class of subsurface flow problems in porous media, which exhibit seepage faces. We focus on a representative case of the steady state flows governed by a nonlinear Darcy-Buckingham law with physical constraints on subsurface-atmosphere boundaries. This leads to the formulation of the problem as a variational inequality. The solutions to this problem are investigated using an adaptive finite element method based on a dual-weighted a posteriori error estimate, derived with the aim of reducing error in a specific targ…
Flow and multicomponent reactive transport in saturated/unsaturated porous media are modeled by ensembles of computational particles moving on regular lattices according to specific random walk rules. The occupation number of the lattice sites is updated with a global random walk (GRW) procedure which spreads the particles from a lattice site with computational costs comparable to those for a single random walk step in sequential procedures. To cope with the nonlinearity and the degeneracy of the Richards equation the GRW flow solver uses linearization techniques similar to the $L$-scheme deve…
The simulation of soil-structure interaction problems involving two-phase materials poses significant challenges in geotechnical engineering. These challenges arise due to differences in material stiffnesses, the interaction between multiple phases, high bulk modulus of pore fluid, and low permeability. The conventional explicit time integration scheme is limited by its conditional stability, necessitating small time step sizes and resulting in pressure oscillations under rapid loading conditions. To address these issues, we propose a stable two-phase contact algorithm within the Material Poin…
