MORE | Spring 2022

Drainage Flow of a Viscous Compressible Fluid (Gas) from a Small Curved Narrow Conduit

Current natural gas reserves lie trapped in dense rocks. As such, to access these gas resources efficiently, a better understanding of its production mechanisms is required. The research starts with a study of a volumetric expansion-driven drainage flow of a viscous compressible fluid from a small capillary and channel in the low Mach number limit. COMSOL Multiphysics is used to simulate the drainage flow in a system with a tortuous conduit connected to a reservoir using 2D Pressure Acoustics, Transient Module. The drainage of the fluid was seen to be controlled by the slow decay of the acoustic wave inside the capillary. Also, the drainage rate goes contrary to that predicted by the lubrication-based theory. Further understanding of the drainage rate is highly recommended.