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Stress‐Induced Anomalous Transport in Natural Fracture Networks
Department of Earth Sciences, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, Minneapolis, MN, USA;Saint Anthony Falls Laboratory, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, Minneapolis, MN, USA.ORCID iD: 0000-0002-4961-6899
Department of Earth Sciences, ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.ORCID iD: 0000-0002-3990-4707
Institute of Environmental Assessment and Water Research (IDAEA), Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), Barcelona, Spain.ORCID iD: 0000-0002-3940-282X
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA.ORCID iD: 0000-0002-7370-2332
2019 (English)In: Water resources research, ISSN 0043-1397, E-ISSN 1944-7973, Vol. 55, no 5, p. 4163-4185Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

We investigate the effects of geological stress on fluid flow and tracer transport in natural fracture networks. We show the emergence of non-Fickian (anomalous) transport from the interplay among fracture network geometry, aperture heterogeneity, and geological stress. In this study, we extract the fracture network geometry from the geological map of an actual rock outcrop, and we simulate the geomechanical behavior of fractured rock using a hybrid finite-discrete element method. We analyze the impact of stress on the aperture distribution, fluid flow field, and tracer transport properties. Both stress magnitude and orientation have strong effects on the fracture aperture field, which in turn affects fluid flow and tracer transport through the system. We observe that stress anisotropy may cause significant shear dilation along long, curved fractures that are preferentially oriented to the stress loading. This, in turn, induces preferential flow paths and anomalous early arrival of tracers. An increase in stress magnitude enhances aperture heterogeneity by introducing more small apertures, which exacerbates late-time tailing. This effect is stronger when there is higher heterogeneity in the initial aperture field. To honor the flow field with strong preferential flow paths, we extend the Bernoulli Continuous Time Random Walk model to incorporate dual velocity correlation length scales. The proposed upscaled transport model captures anomalous transport through stressed fracture networks and agrees quantitatively with the high-fidelity numerical simulations.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
American Geophysical Union (AGU), 2019. Vol. 55, no 5, p. 4163-4185
National Category
Oceanography, Hydrology and Water Resources
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-507690DOI: 10.1029/2019wr024944ISI: 000474848500031OAI: oai:DiVA.org:uu-507690DiVA, id: diva2:1781695
Available from: 2023-07-10 Created: 2023-07-10 Last updated: 2023-08-01Bibliographically approved

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Lei, Qinghua

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