Heat Conduction in Porous Media Characterized by Fractal Geometry

Nonlinear Finite Element Model for Bending Analysis of Functionally-Graded Porous Circular/Annular Micro-Plates under Thermomechanical Loads Using Quasi-3D Reddy Third-Order Plate Theory

A nonlinear finite element model for axisymmetric bending of micro circular/annular plates under thermal and mechanical loading was developed using quasi-3D Reddy third-order shear deformation theory. The developed finite element model accounts for a variation of material constituents utilizing a power-law distribution of a two-constituent material, three different porosity distributions through plate thickness, and geometrical nonlinearity. The modified couple stress theory was utilized to account for the strain gradient effects using a single material length scale parameter. Three different types of porosity distributions that have the same overall volume fraction but different enhanced areas were considered as a form of cosine functions. The effects of the material and porosity distribution, microstructure-dependency, the geometric nonlinearity, and various boundary conditions on the bending response of functionally-graded porous axisymmetric microplates under thermomechanical loads were studied using the developed nonlinear finite element model.

Energy-efficient biochar production for thermal backfill applications

The function of engineered thermal backfills surrounding underground pipelines of the crude oil industry is to prohibit heat migration for the design period of 25 to 50 years. Biochar is suitable for reconstituting standard thermal backfill material since it is biochemically inert and has a low heat conductivity. However, the preparation of biochar from biomass involves an energy-intensive pyrolysis process. This study aims to make biochar production energy-efficient via optimizing the pyrolysis temperatures, specifically for thermal backfill applications. Ten distinct biochars were prepared by pyrolyzing two waste biomass, i.e., water hyacinth (WH) and sugarcane bagasse (SB), at temperatures ranging from 300 to 700 °C. The biochars were assessed based on their thermal conductivity, energy consumption, yield, and stability in soil for the design period. The thermal conductivity of produced biochars varied in a narrow range of 0.10 to 0.13 W m^-1 K^-1 with different pyrolysis temperatures, which is possibly due to marginal differences in their microstructure, mineralogy, and physicochemical properties. The findings revealed that the biochar produced at lowest pyrolysis temperature (300 °C) consumed least energy and produced maximum yield. However, it was not suitable for thermal backfill applications due to its inadequate carbon stability in soil. Therefore, the current study recommends a pyrolysis temperature of 400 °C for thermal backfill applications. The recommended pyrolysis temperature was found to be at least 60% energy efficient in comparison to pyrolysis at 700 °C for both the feedstocks. This study provides crucial insight into the role of pyrolysis temperature for tailoring biochar production for intended applications.

Numerical Network Modeling of Heat and Moisture Transfer through Capillary-Porous Building Materials

The article presents the modeling of the dynamics of the vapor-gas mixture and heat and mass transfer (sorption-desorption) in the capillary structure of the porous medium. This approach is underpinned by the fact that the porous structure is represented by a system of linear microchannels oriented along the axes of a three-dimensional coordinate system. The equivalent diameter of these channels corresponds to the average pore diameter, and the ratio of the total pore volume to the volume of the entire porous material corresponds to its porosity. The entire channel area is modeled by a set of cubic elements with a certain humidity, moisture content, pressure and temperature. A simulation is carried out taking into account the difference in temperatures of each of the phases: solid, liquid and gas.

Numerical Investigation on Heat-Transfer and Hydromechanical Performance Inside Contaminant-Insensitive Sublimators Under a Vacuum Environment for Spacecraft Applications

The contaminant-insensitive sublimator (CIS) is a novel water sublimator in development, which uses two porous substrates to separate the sublimation point from the pressure-control point and provide long-life effective cooling for spacecraft. Many essential studies need to be carried out in the field. To overcome the reliability issues such as ice breakthrough caused by large temperature or pressure differences, the CIS development unit model, the mathematical models of heat and mass transfer and the evaluation coefficient have been established. Numerical investigations have been implemented aiming at the impacts of physical properties of porous substrate, physical properties of working fluid, orifice layouts and orifice-structure parameters on the characteristics of flow field and temperature field. The numerical investigation shows some valuable conclusion, such as the temperature uniformity coefficient at the bottom surface of the large pore substrate is 0.997669 and the pressure uniformity coefficient at the same surface is 0.85361267. These numerical results can provide structure and data reference for the CIS design of lunar probe or spacesuit.

Thermal Conduction Simulation Based on Reconstructed Digital Rocks with Respect to Fractures

Effective thermal conductivity (ETC), as a necessary parameter in the thermal properties of rock, is affected by the pore structure and the thermal conduction conditions. To evaluate the effect of fractures and saturated fluids on sandstone’s thermal conductivity, we simulated thermal conduction along three orthogonal (X, Y, and Z) directions under air- and water-saturated conditions on reconstructed digital rocks with different fractures. The results show that the temperature distribution is separated by the fracture. The significant difference between the thermal conductivities of solid and fluid is the primary factor influencing the temperature distribution, and the thermal conduction mainly depends on the solid phase. A nonlinear reduction of ETC is observed with increasing fracture length and angle. Only when the values of the fracture length and angle are large, a negative effect of fracture aperture on the ETC is apparent. Based on the partial least squares (PLS) regression method, the fluid thermal conductivity shows the greatest positive influence on the ETC value. The fracture length and angle are two other factors significantly influencing the ETC, while the impact of fracture aperture may be ignored. We obtained a predictive equation of ETC which considers the related parameters of digital rocks, including the fracture length, fracture aperture, angle between the fracture and the heat flux direction, porosity, and the thermal conductivity of saturated fluid.