Homogenization of a pore scale model for precipitation and dissolution in porous media

Abstract

In this article, we employ homogenization techniques to provide a rigorous derivation of the Darcy scale model for precipitation and dissolution in porous media. The starting point is the pore scale model in van Duijn & Pop (2004), which is a coupled system of evolution equations, involving a parabolic equation which models ion transport in the fluid phase of a periodic porous medium, coupled to an ordinary differential equations modelling dissolution and precipitation at the grains boundary.

The main challenge is in dealing with the dissolution and precipitation rates, which involve a monotone but possibly discontinuous function. In order to pass to the limit in these rate functions at the boundary of the grains, we prove strong two-scale convergence for the concentrations at the microscopic boundary and use refined arguments in order to identify the form of the macroscopic dissolution rate, which is again a discontinuous function. The resulting upscaled model is consistent with the Darcy scale model proposed in Knabner et al. (1995).