Supervisors: Dr Mohad M.Nezhad (Engineering)

The transport of chemical substances in porous media is relevant in many different applications. For example, for the assessment of nuclear waste deposition sites or for the coordination of remediation actions after a contamination hazard, predictive simulation tools are required. These tools have to account for the uncertainty in the flow behaviour and soil parameters, since measurements of the porous media structure and complex turbulent flow behaviour are typically very scarcely available [1-2]. The main goal is to develop a simulation framework for tracer flow and transport that provides probabilistic information about local tracer concentration evolutions. In this context, a probability density function (PDF) method will be developed. It accounts for advective transport, pore-scale dispersion, and chemical fluid phase reactions. A multi-level stochastic method will be developed, which allows to combine expensive methods with cheap approximate solvers to achieve output statistics more efficiently. Furthermore, advanced data science methods for transport uncertainty quantification will be used.

References

[1] Nezhad M.M. Rezania M. Baioni E. (2019). TRANSPORT POROUS MED. 126, 5–22.
[2] Nezhad M.M. Rezania M. Joekar-Niasar V. (2019). TRANSPORT POROUS MED. 126,1-4.