Thermal reservoir modeling in petroleum geomechanics

Thermal oil recovery processes involve high pressures and temperatures, leading to large volume changes and induced stresses. These cannot be handled by traditional reservoir simulation because it does not consider coupled geomechanics effects. In this paper we present a fully coupled, thermal half‐space model using a hybrid DDFEM method. A finite element method (FEM) solution is adopted for the reservoir and the surrounding thermally affected zone, and a displacement discontinuity method is used for the surrounding elastic, non‐thermal zone. This approach analyzes stress, pressure, temperature and volume change in the reservoir; it also provides stresses and displacements around the reservoir (including transient ground surface movements) in a natural manner without introducing extra spatial discretization outside the FEM zone. To overcome spurious spatial temperature oscillations in the convection‐dominated thermal advection–diffusion problem, we place the transient problem into an advection–diffusion–reaction problem framework, which is then efficiently addressed by a stabilized finite element approach, the subgrid‐scale/gradient subgrid‐scale method. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

关于渗流有限单元法因时空离散而产生的误差讨论

应用有限单元法进行地下水模拟及管理,由于把本来连续的时间和空间离散化,因而会造成一定误差,有时这种误差是不容忽视的.通过计算实例,分析了不同的空间、时间离散格式而产生的误差,应用迭加原理及特征值有限单元法,将因空间和时间离散而产生的误差区分开来,并探讨了减小误差的方法.     

Stochastic finite element methods for the seismic response of soils

Some of the available stochastic finite element methods are adapted and evaluated for the analyses of response of soils with uncertain properties subjected to earthquake induced random ground motion. In this study, the dynamic response of a soil mass, with finite element discretization, is formulated in the frequency domain. The spectral density function of the response variables are obtained from which the evaluation of the root-mean-squared and the most probable extreme values of the response are made. The material non-linearities are incorporated by using strain compatible moduli and damping of soils using an equivalent linear model for stress–strain behaviour of soils and an iterative solution of the response. The spatial variability of the shear modulus is described through a random field model and the earthquake included motion is treated as a stochastic process. The available formulations of direct Monte-Carlo simulation, first-order perturbation method, a spectral decomposition method with Neumann expansion and a spectral decomposition method with Polynomial Chaos are used to develop stochastic finite element analyses of the seismic response of soils. The numerical results from these approaches are compared with respect to their accuracy and computational efficiency. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.     

A time‐discontinuous Galerkin method for the dynamical analysis of porous media

We present a time‐discontinuous Galerkin method (DGT) for the dynamic analysis of fully saturated porous media. The numerical method consists of a finite element discretization in space and time. The discrete basis functions are continuous in space and discontinuous in time. The continuity across the time interval is weakly enforced by a flux function. Two applications and several numerical investigations confirm the quality of the proposed space–time finite element scheme. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Andra Couplex 1 Test Case: Comparisons Between Finite-Element, Mixed Hybrid Finite Element and Finite Volume Element Discretizations

We present here results for the Andra Couplex 1 test case, obtained with the code Cast3m. This code is developped at the CEA (Commissariat l'nergie atomique) and is used mainly to solve problems of solid mechanics, fluid mechanics and heat transfers. Different types of discretization are available, among them finite element, finite volume and mixed hybrid finite element method. Cast3m is also a componant of the platteform Alliances (co-developped by Andra, CEA), which will be used by Andra for the safety calculation of an underground waste disposal in year 2004. We solve the Darcy equation for the water flow and a convection–diffusion transport equation for the Iodine 129 which escapes from a repository cave into the water. The water flow is calculated with a MHFE discretization. It is shown that this method provides sharp results even on relatively coarse grids. The convection–diffusion transport equation is discretized with FE (Finite Element), MHFE (Mixed Hybrid Finite Element) and FV (Finite Volume) methods. In our comparison, we point out the differences of these methods in term of accuracy, respect of the maximum principle and calculations cost. Neither the finite element nor the mixed hybrid finite element approach respects the maximum principle. This results in the presence of negative concentrations near the repository cave, whereas FV calculations respect the monotonicity. We show that mass lumping techniques suppress this problem but with strong restrictions on the grid. FE and MHFE approaches are more accurate than FV for the diffusion equation, but the overall results are equivalent since the advective terms are dominant in the far field and are discretized with centered schemes. We conclude by studying the influence of the grid: a very fine grid near the repository solves almost all the problems of monotonicity, without employing mass lumping techniques. We also observed a very important increase of the accuracy on a structured grid made up of rectangles.     

核废料储库周边介质热力耦合数值分析

以热力学和热弹性理论为基础,分析热-力相互耦合作用及其对热特性参数和力特性参数的影响。建立了非等温条件下的耦合作用控制方程,给出了相应的空间离散和时间离散形式。利用有限元法对一核废料储库的平面问题进行了计算,讨论了储库周围粘性土介质内温度场、应力场等的动态发展变化规律,并分析了耦合效应对计算结果的影响。研究表明,随时间的增长,热能由储库边壁不断向远处传导和扩散,而在空间上又处于不断变化的非等温状态,这一动态变化过程必然会诱致周围土介质内应力的产生和发展,并随温度的变化而不断变化。     

Application of extended Kalman filter to back analysis of the natural stress state accounting for measuring uncertainties

In this work, we present a numerical procedure for determining the nature stress state in the rock mass around a tunnel. A finite element method is applied for analyzing the direct problems of tunneling during the back analysis of parameter estimation, in which a no‐tension elastic–plastic model is used to simulate the elastic–tensile and elastic–plastic‐tensile failure states which often occur in the cases of underground excavation in heavily jointed rock masses. By considering the natural stress state as random parameters of the tunneling system, the Kalman filter method is employed for feedback analysis to modify the parameter values in a statistical context, which uses the prior information in the process of estimation and employs a set of displacements obtained from field measurements. To verify the effectiveness of the proposed method of inverse analysis, the developed numerical procedure is applied to a synthetic example of deep tunnels in yielding rock masses. The relative importance of the a priori and updating information is investigated, as is the importance of their uncertainty. The results show great potential of the proposed approach. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A model for moisture and heat flow in fractured unsaturated porous media

The present study investigates propagation of a cohesive crack in non‐isothermal unsaturated porous medium under mode I conditions. Basic points of skeleton deformation, moisture, and heat transfer for unsaturated porous medium are presented. Boundary conditions on the crack surface that consist of mechanical interaction of the crack and the porous medium, water, and heat flows through the crack are taken into consideration. For spatial discretization, the extended finite element method is used. This method uses enriched shape functions in addition to ordinary shape functions for approximation of displacement, pressure, and temperature fields. The Heaviside step function and the distance function are exploited as enrichment functions for representing the crack surfaces displacement and the discontinuous vertical gradients of the pressure and temperature fields along the crack, respectively. For temporal discretization, backward finite difference scheme is applied. Problems solved from the literature show the validity of the model as well as the dependency of structural response on the material properties and loading. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Selection of p–y curves for the design of single laterally loaded piles

Two-dimensional finite element analysis has been used to find load–transfer relationships for translation of an infinitely long pile through undrained soil for a variety of soil-constitutive models. It has been shown that these load–transfer curves can be used as p–y curves in the analysis of single piles undergoing lateral pile head loading in undrained soils with non-linear stress–strain laws. Lateral pile response deduced from 2-D analysis input to the subgrade reaction method has been compared to the behaviour of a single pile analysed using three-dimensional finite element analysis. Good agreement between the two methods for non-linear soils suggests that the 2-D analysis may form a useful design method for calculation of p–y curves. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Finite deformation analysis of geomaterials

The mathematical structure and numerical analysis of classical small deformation elasto–plasticity is generally well established. However, development of large deformation elastic–plastic numerical formulation for dilatant, pressure sensitive material models is still a research area. In this paper we present development of the finite element formulation and implementation for large deformation, elastic–plastic analysis of geomaterials. Our developments are based on the multiplicative decomposition of the deformation gradient into elastic and plastic parts. A consistent linearization of the right deformation tensor together with the Newton method at the constitutive and global levels leads toward an efficient and robust numerical algorithm. The presented numerical formulation is capable of accurately modelling dilatant, pressure sensitive isotropic and anisotropic geomaterials subjected to large deformations. In particular, the formulation is capable of simulating the behaviour of geomaterials in which eigentriads of stress and strain do not coincide during the loading process. The algorithm is tested in conjunction with the novel hyperelasto–plastic model termed the B material model, which is a single surface (single yield surface, affine single ultimate surface and affine single potential surface) model for dilatant, pressure sensitive, hardening and softening geomaterials. It is specifically developed to model large deformation hyperelasto–plastic problems in geomechanics. We present an application of this formulation to numerical analysis of low confinement tests on cohesionless granular soil specimens recently performed in a SPACEHAB module aboard the Space Shuttle during the STS‐89 mission. We compare numerical modelling with test results and show the significance of added confinement by the thin hyperelastic latex membrane undergoing large stretching. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Numerical analysis of a one‐dimensional infiltration problem in unsaturated soil by a seepage–deformation coupled method

A multiphase coupled elasto‐viscoplastic finite element analysis formulation, based on the theory of porous media, is used to describe the rainfall infiltration process into a one‐dimensional soil column. Using this framework, we have numerically analyzed the generation of pore water pressure and deformations when rainfall is applied to the soil. A parametric study, including rainfall intensity, soil–water characteristic curves, and permeability, is carried out to observe their influence on the changes in pore water pressure and volumetric strain. From the numerical results, it is shown that the generation of pore water pressure and volumetric strain is mainly controlled by material parameters α and n′ that describe the soil–water characteristic curve. A comparison with the laboratory results shows that the proposed method can describe very well the characteristics observed during the experiments of one‐dimensional water infiltration into a layered unsaturated soil column. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Dynamic soil–structure interaction analysis using Lanczos vectors with adaptive time integration technique

An analytical procedure to obtain the response of soil–structure interaction problems, time domain is described. The procedure makes use of large domain for descritization along with co-ordinate transformation using Lanczos vectors. The responses are obtained in time domain using an adaptive direct integration method. The scheme has the ability to estimate errors due to temporal discretization as well as co-ordinate transformation. The procedure has been applied to half-space problems and non-convex domains for validation of the scheme, and the scheme obeys causality condition in both the situations. The present method has all the advantages of time domain scheme which is local both in space and time with small computational effort. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Solution of quasi‐static large‐strain problems by the material point method

A procedure for solving quasi‐static large‐strain problems by the material point method is presented. Owing to the Lagrangian–Eulerian features of the method, problems associated with excessive mesh distortions that develop in the Lagrangian formulations of the finite element method are avoided. Three‐dimensional problems are solved utilizing 15‐noded prismatic and 10‐noded tetrahedral elements with quadratic interpolation functions as well as an implicit integration scheme. An algorithm for exploiting the numerical integration procedure on the computational mesh is proposed. Several numerical examples are shown. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Analysis of the vane test considering size and time effects

An analysis of the vane test using an Arbitrary Lagrangian–Eulerian formulation within a finite element framework is presented. This is suitable for soft clays for which the test is commonly used to measure in situ undrained shear strength. Constitutive laws are expressed in terms of shear stress–shear strain rates, and that permits the study of time effects in a natural manner. An analysis of the shear stress distributions on the failure surface according to the material model is presented. The effect of the constitutive law on the shear band amplitude and on the position of the failure surface is shown. In general, the failure surface is found at 1–1·01 times the vane radius, which is consistent with some experimental results. The problem depends on two dimensionless parameters that represent inertial and viscous forces. For usual vane tests, viscous forces are predominant, and the measured shear strength depends mainly on the angular velocity applied. That can explain some of the comparisons reported when using different vane sizes. Finally, the range of the shear strain rate applied to the soil is shown to be fundamental when comparing experimental results from vane, triaxial and viscosimeter tests. Appart from that, an experimental relation between undrained shear strength and vane angular velocity has been reproduced by this simulation. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Comparative Study of Numercial Solution of PDE inGeosciences

A number of phenomena and processes in geosciences can be summarized by second order partial differential equations. The major numerical methods for their solution include the classical finite difference method and the finite element method newly developed in the last two or three decades. Since 1977 the author has proved that for the Laplace and Poisson equations, these two methods are identical and are different only in the process of formulation. For transient problems, such as heat conduction in the earth and the groundwater and oil-gas unsteady flow in porous media, there are some differences in resulting linear algebraic euqations. In general, two methods give similar results, but when the time step is decreased to some extent, the resulting algebraic equation will be consistent with the anti-heat conduction equation rather than the original heat conduction equation. This is the reason why unrealistic potentials are produced by the finite element method. Such a problem can be overcome by using the     

A FIC‐based stabilized mixed finite element method with equal order interpolation for solid–pore fluid interaction problems

A new mixed displacement‐pressure element for solving solid–pore fluid interaction problems is presented. In the resulting coupled system of equations, the balance of momentum equation remains unaltered, while the mass balance equation for the pore fluid is stabilized with the inclusion of higher‐order terms multiplied by arbitrary dimensions in space, following the finite calculus (FIC) procedure. The stabilized FIC‐FEM formulation can be applied to any kind of interpolation for the displacements and the pressure, but in this work, we have used linear elements of equal order interpolation for both set of unknowns. Examples in 2D and 3D are presented to illustrate the accuracy of the stabilized formulation for solid–pore fluid interaction problems. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

岩土介质三维快速拉格朗日数值分析方法研究

研究了FLAC3D（fast lagrangian analysis of continua in 3 dimensions）的特点,并与有限单元法作了比较。FLAC3D方法以结点运动方程为支配方程,追踪了介质从受荷到达到平衡状态的过程,而有限元法是根据介质力学平衡方程直接求解,这是二者主要区别。FLAC3D没有采用介质真实的阻尼特性和结点质量,给出的不是介质所经历的真实过程,不能正确反映过程的影响,因此给出的介质应力和变形计算结果的物理意义是不甚明确的。求解过程中的介质振动,是一种噪音,可引起弹塑性介质计算结果误差,而弹性介质的计算结果几乎不受影响。研究指出了FLAC3D方法的优缺点。还通过算例作了四个方面的研究：(1) Drucker-Prager屈服准则与Mohr-Coulomb屈服准则比较;(2) 膨胀角取值对计算结果的影响;(3) 大变形与小变形对计算结果的影响;(4) 精度设置对计算结果的影响。研究表明,Drucker-Prager准则与Mohr-Coulomb准则结果差异颇大;膨胀角取值对结果的影响是敏感和显著的;一般情况下,取小变形模式是合适的,计算精度取10-5是足够的。     

基于ABAQUS平台的水力裂缝扩展有限元模拟研究

随着扩展有限元理论的深入研究,利用扩展有限元方法模拟水力压裂具有了一定的可操作性。相比于常规有限元方法,XFEM方法具有计算结果精度高和计算量小的优点。但是,如何模拟射孔孔眼、如何模拟流体与岩石相互作用以及分析水力裂缝的扩展规律仍然是难题。以研究水力压裂裂缝扩展规律为目的,建立了岩石多孔介质应力平衡方程、流体渗流连续性方程和边界条件。通过有限元离散化方法对耦合方程矩阵进行处理。通过富集函数定义初始裂缝（射孔孔眼）,选择最大主应力及损伤变量D分别作为裂缝起裂和扩展判定准则,利用水平集方法模拟水力裂缝扩展过程。数值模拟结果显示：增加射孔方位角、压裂液排量和减小水平地应力差,起裂压力上升;黏度对起裂压力无明显影响。增加射孔方位角、压裂液排量、黏度和减小水平地应力差值有助于裂缝宽度的增加。增加水平地应力差值、压裂液排量和减小射孔方位角以及压裂液黏度有助于裂缝长度增加,反之亦然。基于ABAQUS的水力裂缝扩展有限元法可对不同井型和诸多储层物性参数及压裂施工参数进行分析,且裂缝形态逼真,裂缝面凹凸程度清晰,结果准确。此研究可作为一种简便有效研究水力压裂裂缝扩展规律的方法为油田水力压裂设计与施工提供参考与依据。     

基于边界元法的边坡矢量和稳定分析

矢量和法物理力学意义明确,计算简单,且能根据边坡当前的应力分布状态合理地评价其整体稳定性状态。其中边坡的应力状态通常是采用有限元法来求解。由于边界元法具有研究问题降阶、离散化带来的误差值仅产生在边界以及计算量小等优点,在工程中得到了广泛应用;对于平面问题,以源点作为原点,以所积分单元的切向和法向为坐标轴建立局部坐标系,对于线性单元可以得到所有积分的解析解。因此,可以得到计算区域内部任意点的场变量的解析解,这就保证了位于边界附近区域场变量的精度。利用边界元法得到二维边坡体内连续的应力分布状态,使用矢量和法对该边坡进行稳定性分析,并且与基于有限元的矢量和法、极限平衡法进行对比分析。边坡圆弧滑面和折线滑面的计算结果表明,基于边界元法得到的矢量和安全系数和基于有限元的矢量和法、极限平衡法基本一致;边界元法对应的矢量和安全系数对边界单元尺寸不敏感。