Introduction

The Hydraulic FEM physics is the responsible for providing an implementation for the Darcy's law that can be used together with the [FEM process] [https://www.tecgraf.puc-rio.br/gema/plugins/process/femProcess/doxygen/html/index.html] to solve the steady state and transient flow through a porous media such as rock, in 2D and 3D. The main equation solved by this physics is:

\begin{eqnarray*}v_H = -k_H \Delta H \end{eqnarray*}

where:

\( v_H \) is the hydraulic flux in m/s
\( k_H \) is the hydraulic conductivity in m/s
\( \Delta H \) is the gradient of the hydraulic head between those points, \( H \) is the hydraulic head wich is the sum of the pressure head \( (p/\gamma_f) \) and the elevation head \( z \).

In order to solve the hydraulic problem we need to state appropiate initial and boundary conditions. Two types of boudary conditions be emplemented in GeMA, Dirichlet (Prescribed pressure in kPa) and Neumann (prescibed flow in m^3/s).

Figure 1: Initial and Boundary conditions for the flow equation.

The Hydro Fem Physic supports the following formulations:

gemaHydrodualPorosity

Formulation Reference

The FEM discretization of the hydraulics equation used by the Hydro Fem physics plugin is based on the book Fundamentals of the Modeling Groundwater Flow and Contaminat by Jacob Bear e Alexander H.D Cheng, 2010.

The Hydraulic FEM physics plugin supports the following formulations:

Continuum Elements
Interface Elements
Pipe (1D) Element

Plugin options

A reference manual documenting the set of state variables and material properties expected by the plugin, along with all of its supported configuration and result options can be found [here][https://www.tecgraf.puc-rio.br/gema/plugins/physics/thermoFemPhysics/doxygen/html/gema_thermo_fem_physics_plugin_options.html].

Example

Several examples simulations involving steady state and transient flow calculations are available at the examples directory provided with the GeMA instalation. A summary of those examples can be found [here][https://www.tecgraf.puc-rio.br/gema/gema/doxygen/html/gema_examples.html].

Plugin options

GeMA project main page